Re: State Park Patrol????

[BMcCrary27@aol.com]

In a message dated 08/04/2000 1:08:55 PM Pacific Daylight Time, 
aungiesh@unos.org writes:

<< I would love to hear more about your state park patrol program. 
Coincidently
 I was talking to our Va State Parks Director last night about this very
 thing and he was slightly intrigued.  (he loves having the horses in his
 parks).
 Can you tell me more?  
 Is it all volunteer?
 What type of training?
 What types of problems/concerns do you address?
 Do you function more like a host/hostess or do you have enforcement powers?
  >>

It's all volunteer, but we are considered unpaid "employees" of the state.  
Therefore, if one is injured on the job, the state pays medical and dental 
costs (this happened to me once).  We have to buy our own uniforms and we 
have special saddle pads with state park insignia patches on them.  I really 
believe the uniforms and the horses are enough to command the respect of most 
beach-goers.  On the other hand, the horses are very good ice-breakers.  
People love to pet them.
We have to be experienced riders, our horses must be over 5 years old and 
skilled trail horses.  One of our group offers a training day once a year and 
introduces the horses to everything from smoke to helicopters. This is 
non-mandatory.
We are supposed to read enough about the area we patrol so that we can 
answer, with intelligence, questions on the local wildlife (in this case, 
seals, mostly).
We must attend CPR training and first aid training annually.
Our duties run from "host" to non-armed law enforcement, read "dog patrol".  
"Sorry to tell you folks, but the park doesn't allow dogs on the beach, so 
you'll have to take them back to your car."  Or, "No, no, you can't harass 
the wildlife.  You must stay 20 feet away from the seals.  They appear 
sleepy, but if you get too close, they have a tendency to rear up and they 
have a nasty bite."  We've never had a problem with resistance, but if it 
should occur, we are instructed to radio the nearest ranger, who IS a law 
enforcement officer.  We are never allowed to get into a fracas with the 
public.  We carry a powerful portable radio with which we can call the park 
HQs and the necessary rangers.  One of our great adventures was finding a 
beached rubber boat full of baled marijuana.  It had been part of a smuggling 
job and had somehow floated ashore, minus person, but with cargo 
intact...lots of it.  The horses took one whiff and said "yummy".  We had to 
remove them before they became hallucinogenic.  Lud and I actually made the 
first discovery of the tell-tale tracks and indicators that a smuggling 
operation was going on.  
And then there was the  "peeping tom" incident, that was fun...herding this 
poor humiliated man up the beach in front of his buddies and all other 
bystanders.
We've been members of this Mounted Assistance Unit since 1983.  Lud and I 
have built bridges and cleared trail as well.  The entire route is several 
miles up the coast and then return.  If we ride it endurance style, we make 
two round trips in about 4 hours.  If we just walk and relax, one round trip.
We've never done this before we had Arabs, so we can't speak for other 
breeds, but our Arabs are very watchful.  They aren't really wild about going 
into the ocean, however.  We're  lucky if we can get them to splash through 
the very shallow part at the edge.  It's probably a lack of training rather 
than complete rejection of water, pre se.

Barbara