Latest / The Horsehuman Connection Matrix / Theresa Dermarest Produer of " Throw away Horses" and " Keiko The Untold Story"

Transcript

Theresa Dermarest Produer of " Throw away Horses" and " Keiko The Untold Story" · The Horsehuman Connection Matrix

• 0:00
  Speaker: I'm Ishi Abel with the Horse Human Connection Matrix, today I have with me Teresa Demarest, who is a movie producer.
• 0:07
  Speaker: She has produced, Throwaway Horses and keiko: The Untold Story of the Star of Free Willy, yes.
• 0:14
  Speaker: And I I did a little bit of research on that.
• 0:17
  Speaker: Although I was not able to watch the entire film, I, I have a, a kind of a synopsis idea about that.
• 0:23
  Speaker: So I think the fact that you've made these two films is just incredible, and that you were able to, it sounds like, especially with the second one, get it made and out to the public in a relatively short time.
• 0:36
  Speaker: Am I right?
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: No.
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: No?
• 0:39
  Speaker: Okay.
• 0:40
  Speaker: Um,
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: it took us four, almost five years-
• 0:43
  Speaker: Okay
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: uh, because of COVID.
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: And after we first started we lost a lot of the people that we had hired to help us, camera people, editors, this sort of thing.
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: And a lot of the filming I had to do myself, and I'm not necessarily a cinematographer.
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: You know, I have, I, I'm a certainly a jack of all trades, but, uh, that's not one of my best abilities.
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: So we lost a lot of people, and COVID made it impossible for us to do interviews.
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: And, um, it was hard.
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: So that's what, why it took so long.
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: But frankly, I'm really glad it took that long.
• 1:22
  Speaker: Because
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: as time went by, we found more footage.
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: We had more interest.
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: It's a better film now than it would've been had we went bada bing bada boom, out, here you go.
• 1:35
  Speaker: Had you been faster with it.
• 1:36
  Speaker: And that- Yeah that's, and, uh, you know, timing for anything is such an important issue.
• 1:41
  Speaker: And I was reading a quote just yesterday about slowing down, and sometimes if you get there prematurely, you miss some of the why and how and what you're doing there.
• 1:52
  Speaker: And, um, so that I like that.
• 1:54
  Speaker: Because- I like that, I like that point.
• 1:56
  Speaker: When you're telling the story of some of the animals, the horses and the whale in the movies, how- How do you tell the animal's story without getting the other people and yourself that are working on the film, their stories projected into it?
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: Oh, you, I mean, there's a certain amount of that happens.
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: You can't help it.
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: But my goal, like for example, in doing Keiko, which really prepared me for doing this one, there'd been a lot of political, uh, movies done about Keiko.
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: Cousteau, a whole bunch of people did a bunch of political movies, and it was all about them.
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: What they were doing with Keiko, but nobody concentrated on Keiko.
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: What, what did...
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: so I did my best in the Keiko film to follow Keiko.
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: Now, people and political issues come about as a part of that, but I tried to keep my, what is Keiko saying?
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: What is Keiko doing?
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: And, it was amazing.
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: He, he was amazing.
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: And so I tried to do that with the Throwaway Horses movie.
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: W- we followed about six horses, I believe, and- What is that horse doing, and why are they doing it?
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: You know, there were some dangerous horses, some very severely injured horses.
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: There were race horses that we followed.
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: And, the important thing is that the rescue people that we followed with these horses, they were, they cared about what's, what is the horse trying to tell me?
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: Listening.
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: Boy, I'm a terrible listener sometimes.
• 3:43
  Speaker: It's challenging.
• 3:45
  Speaker: I will- Hmm.
• 3:46
  Speaker: It can be challenging, but I, I've, I've come to adapt to that philosophy that, you know, people put all kinds of you know, sort of ideas on horses' behavior that actually their brains are not capable of.
• 3:58
  Speaker: Like, they're not disrespectful.
• 3:59
  Speaker: They're not misbehaving.
• 4:01
  Speaker: They're not- No tricking anybody.
• 4:02
  Speaker: No.
• 4:03
  Speaker: I always reduce it to this horse is asking a question.
• 4:06
  Speaker: What question is it asking?
• 4:08
  Speaker 2: That's correct.
• 4:09
  Speaker: And when
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: you- And their defi- their d- their survival, their very survival from their point of view depends on whether they answer that question themselves.
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: Whether they answer it correctly, their survival depends on it.
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: True for us too, but we don't seem to realize that.
• 4:26
  Speaker: Or at least they believe it does, I mean-
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: Yeah
• 4:28
  Speaker: perceived and real are, even with humans, are, are two quite different things.
• 4:33
  Speaker: But with Keiko I was reading a little bit that he went back into the wild at a fairly old age and died- Yes like 18 months later, never really- No,
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: he died five years.
• 4:45
  Speaker: Five years later, okay.
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: Five years later.
• 4:48
  Speaker: And, but, and what I read said that he never swam with wild whales.
• 4:52
  Speaker: Is that true?
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: Oh, you should have s- so you didn't watch- I need to- the whole film.
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: No,
• 4:57
  Speaker: I didn't watch the movie.
• 4:58
  Speaker: Okay.
• 4:58
  Speaker: I, I took the cheat notes, which apparently are not correct at all.
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: Is that correct?
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: Um- I had trouble finding where to watch it the movie, you see, you witness him swimming with wild orcas, even attempting to mate.
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: There was evidence that he attempted to mate.
• 5:15
  Speaker 2: Uh, and we show this to you.
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: There were rake marks on the side of his thing, which is a sign that a female and he were trying to mate.
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: You should go watch the footage.
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: It's m- it's wonderful.
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: He's totally swimming with wild orcas, chasing them and then getting scared and moving back to the boat, then going back out and chasing them.
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: It's quite extraordinary.
• 5:36
  Speaker: Wow.
• 5:37
  Speaker: I will.
• 5:37
  Speaker: Okay, tell me where I can find it again.
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: Amazon Prime.
• 5:41
  Speaker: Okay.
• 5:43
  Speaker: I had trouble- I
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: could-
• 5:44
  Speaker: I, I know.
• 5:44
  Speaker: The day, the day that I sat down to do it, there was a problem with the with the network.
• 5:49
  Speaker: That's what it was.
• 5:50
  Speaker: This is, and- And then I got, and then I got a little afraid that maybe it would be really, really sad, and I wasn't sure.
• 5:56
  Speaker 2: Oh, no, no, no, no, no.
• 5:57
  Speaker 2: No.
• 5:58
  Speaker 2: In fact, watch the credits.
• 6:01
  Speaker: Okay.
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: I, when I was doing the movie, when I, before I did the credits, I would show the movie and people said it's a really good movie, but there's something missing." And I remember I showed, you know, filmmakers do screenings- Mm-hmm to, for people to criticize their film, to see.
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: And every time I did a screening they went,"Oh boy, I'm done," and then they'd rip the movie apart, and I'd go,"Oh my God, they're right." So I finally there was this major studio that said,"Oh, uh, young children will never, will never get this movie, and it's, it's too much for them.
• 6:37
  Speaker 2: Uh, it's, it's too hard.
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: They will never get it." So I went to a local grade school ages 8 to 13, and I filmed them with their parents in back of the room.
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: I filmed them watching the movie as I had it at that point.
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: And they laughed in all the right places.
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: They were moved in all the right places.
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: But the film studio said,"This is, would be a terrible movie to show this age group, and so we're not interested in you." And, uh, and they were wanting to buy it for this much money, you know, tiny bit of money.
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: You know, so they could get it off of the shelf,'cause they were, uh, we didn't know it at the time, but they were SeaWorld supporters.
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: And gave money to SeaWorld.
• 7:20
  Speaker 2: You know?
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: So, uh, they would have loved to have gotten hold of our movie and then put it on the shelf so that no one would ever see it.
• 7:29
  Speaker 2: They s- the, the lights go up, and they're all crying.
• 7:31
  Speaker 2: They're all going, And I go...
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: And the parents are in the back, and I go,"Oh my God, the studio was right.
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: This is..." And then all of a sudden all these hands go up, and this is what we filmed, okay?
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: "Can I...?
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: Give me the microphone.
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: It's all about the money." You know, and they start saying.
• 7:48
  Speaker 2: And another one would raise their hand, and it's like they started talking.
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: "Can we, can uh, can we call our senator?""Yes, you can." And that's, we put over the credits, the kids.
• 7:59
  Speaker 2: What their response to it was, they wanted to call their senator.
• 8:02
  Speaker 2: They got that it was all about the money.
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: And all different, uh, you know, I had no idea that Keiko went through all of that.
• 8:11
  Speaker 2: And that's...
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: So watch the credits because these kids were amazing.
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: Amazing.
• 8:17
  Speaker: Wow.
• 8:17
  Speaker: Okay, so, so the story you're telling now, I'm hearing, like, your tenacity in having to navigate with this first film a system that had a lot of trap doors and not necessarily ethical people and-
• 8:34
  Speaker 2: We almost signed that because we, it was such a big studio, and we thought,"Oh my God, they're courting us.
• 8:39
  Speaker 2: You know, oh, wow, it's my first film." And they would've taken the movie and shoved it on the thing, and we would never have seen it again.
• 8:47
  Speaker: So did some political action come out of this movie?
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: Oh, yeah.
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: We're still getting royalties for Keiko all over the world.
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: People are buying the Keiko DVD of all things.
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: They're watching it on Amazon Prime.
• 9:04
  Speaker 2: Wow.
• 9:04
  Speaker 2: We're still getting major royalties from that.
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: And th- what was that?
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: 12, 13 years ago.
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: Wow.
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: You know, it was a long time ago.
• 9:13
  Speaker: So it can be profitable.
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: What can be
• 9:16
  Speaker: profitable?
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: Making
• 9:17
  Speaker: mo- making movies.
• 9:18
  Speaker 2: Oh, no.
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: We put more...
• 9:21
  Speaker 2: We've, we haven't made all our money back yet.
• 9:24
  Speaker 2: I mean, Keiko cost us about 350,
• 9:28
  Speaker: $400,000.
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: And that's about the average price it costs for an independent filmmaker to put out a documentary.
• 9:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 9:35
  Speaker 2: But we made probably 75% of our, our funds back.
• 9:39
  Speaker 2: Um-
• 9:40
  Speaker: That's pretty good.
• 9:41
  Speaker: How did you get your funding to begin with?
• 9:43
  Speaker: Was it just your own money?
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 9:45
  Speaker 2: It was retirement, my retirement fund.
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: Wow.
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: And I've just put it back into it.
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: Same thing with Throwaway Horses.
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: When you let investors invest in your movie- You have to do what they want.
• 10:00
  Speaker 2: And they all have agendas, and it might not- Not be the right thing.
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: So I've never done that.
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: I've seen people get three-quarters of the way through a film and have to stop and leave it because their investors, uh, had particular requirements of them
• 10:21
  Speaker: Their agendas don't match up or they change.
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: Not at freaking all.
• 10:26
  Speaker: What made you wanna make a film to begin with?
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: Uh, I started with Keiko when Keiko was being moved in o- from Mexico to the Oregon Coast Aquarium.
• 10:39
  Speaker: Mm-hmm.
• 10:39
  Speaker 2: He had been in Mexico for 11 years, I think, and he was being, being moved from there to the Oregon Coast Aquarium.
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: I was surviving cancer, breast cancer, and I had been given six months to live, and I was...
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: felt, on a scale of one to 10, a two, and I was laying on my couch every day waiting to die.
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: Wow.
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: And Keiko would come on the screen during that time.
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: All the TV stations,"Keiko sneezed.
• 11:11
  Speaker 2: Breaking news." Oh.
• 11:14
  Speaker 2: And so he was on a lot in Oregon, and you would have to wait five hours just to see him.
• 11:21
  Speaker 2: And I remember when they dropped him into the to the pen that they had built for him he just, like, went wonk.
• 11:29
  Speaker 2: And that's exactly how I felt.
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: So, uh, I was a musician, professional musician at that time.
• 11:35
  Speaker 2: I used professional music my career to help me survive critical care nursing.
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: We had to keep a balance.
• 11:41
  Speaker 2: And, um, it was an incredible, it was an incredible time.
• 11:47
  Speaker 2: It was, it was just an incredible time.
• 11:49
  Speaker: So some of, some of your wanting to make the movie was because you really felt the way you imagined he did, the way he looked like he
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: felt?
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: Well, yeah, he just was bleh, bleh.
• 12:02
  Speaker 2: So I wrote this piece called, um, Keiko's Dream, and I sent it to the Free Willy-Keiko Foundation, and then they wanted to start doing, at the time when Keiko was still alive, they asked me if I would do, bring my musicians with me and if I would do shows with them for school kids, which we did.
• 12:26
  Speaker 2: And so, it was really wonderful because my sax player, Renato Caranto, and my, my lead guitar player, Tim Ellis, they could play 50 million notes a second, but that's not what I wanted.
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: I wrote this theme, and I wanted them to be Keiko in the song Keiko's Dream.
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: So in the interlude and in the bridge, they had to,"Be Keiko." Okay.
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: And so the school kids was really, w- especially when we showed the movie to small, smaller children- They sometimes came to do live shows with us, and the kids would,"Where's Keiko?
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: Where is he?
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: I hear him."
• 13:10
  Speaker: Oh my gosh.
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: They did a, they did a really good job.
• 13:13
  Speaker: So I love- The high school I love the artistic, like, the empathetic and the artistic connections-
• 13:21
  Speaker 2: Yeah
• 13:21
  Speaker: that started, that formed into this idea that became a film and then another film.
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: They did that.
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: That's amazing.
• 13:31
  Speaker 2: The Free Willy/Keiko Foundation believed in me, and so when Keiko died, they called me and said would I do a music video.
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: Sure.
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: I said,"Sure." Had no idea how to be a filmmaker, didn't have anything.
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: I was a musician.
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: And so they sent me footage, and I got a consumer grade film editing thing, and I did this thing, and it was like, I used that consumer grade thing for a long time.
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: But then they said,"Well, could you make it longer?
• 13:57
  Speaker 2: Could you..." So then I had to get a professional.
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: My current ed- film editing studio has 40 terabytes.
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: I don't know if you're familiar with how big a computer is, but that's a huge amount of room, because we're now doing 4K.
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: And at the time all I had was SD footage, so I had to learn how to convert it to HD, because during that period of time, the world was moving from SD footage, 4x3, to 4K, which is, long and big.
• 14:32
  Speaker 2: And, uh, so it, it, we had our problems, but I cut my teeth on Keiko, and it's because of the Free Willy/Keiko Foundation that I learned to be a f- a, a filmmaker.
• 14:43
  Speaker 2: And we tried to do a film that followed Keiko.
• 14:48
  Speaker 2: So that people could see Keiko.
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: H-
• 14:52
  Speaker: how old were you when you learned to be a filmmaker?
• 14:55
  Speaker 2: 54.
• 14:56
  Speaker: Can I...
• 14:56
  Speaker: I'm 63.
• 14:57
  Speaker: Can I still learn to be a filmmaker?
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: Yes, of course you can.
• 15:01
  Speaker: Okay.
• 15:02
  Speaker: You're obviously- Of course you can you're obviously, like, very bright.
• 15:05
  Speaker 2: I mean- I'm 79 years old
• 15:06
  Speaker: Are you really?
• 15:07
  Speaker: Oh my gosh.
• 15:07
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 15:07
  Speaker: I wouldn't have thought you were more than, like, like a year or two older than me.
• 15:11
  Speaker: You look amazing.
• 15:12
  Speaker 2: I know.
• 15:12
  Speaker 2: I'm 79.
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: I'm gonna be 80 some day soon.
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: It's like, oh my God.
• 15:16
  Speaker 2: Wow.
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: My family tends to...
• 15:18
  Speaker 2: My, m- my grandfather lived to be 103, and the only reason he died is because he was too tired to go out to the field to change the, the, uh, irrigation pipes.
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: So he got on his horse to go out there to move the pipes.
• 15:33
  Speaker 2: The horse spooked, and he landed on his head, and that's how he died.
• 15:37
  Speaker: At 103.
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: He was 103.
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: What a great- My mom-
• 15:40
  Speaker: What a great death.
• 15:41
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 15:42
  Speaker: Sorry, but-
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: That would've been interesting timing you know, of all the ways to go,
• 15:45
  Speaker: that's not too
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: bad.
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: My mom lived to be 93.
• 15:48
  Speaker 2: All my aunts and uncles lived, were long-lived.
• 15:51
  Speaker: Yeah, I've got some longevity in my family, too.
• 15:53
  Speaker: Wow.
• 15:54
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 15:54
  Speaker: Wow.
• 15:55
  Speaker: Okay.
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: So you better have a job to do because it's when you no longer have a job to do that your- Oh your body, because you're getting older, says,"Oh, I guess you don't need to hear anymore.
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: Oh, I guess you don't need to see anymore.
• 16:06
  Speaker 2: Oh, I guess you don't need to walk anymore.
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: We'll shut that down."
• 16:09
  Speaker: Right.
• 16:09
  Speaker: You know?
• 16:10
  Speaker: You just keep going.
• 16:11
  Speaker: You could just-
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah
• 16:11
  Speaker: it's about what you believe.
• 16:13
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 16:13
  Speaker: So let me, let me ask you this question.
• 16:15
  Speaker: It's like getting to know you a little bit.
• 16:16
  Speaker: So you've, you've been a critical care nurse.
• 16:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 16:19
  Speaker: You're a musi- a professional musician.
• 16:22
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 16:23
  Speaker: You decided to become a filmmaker.
• 16:25
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 16:25
  Speaker: You decided to learn about horses- Yeah and whales, and do all of these things.
• 16:30
  Speaker: Do you, Do you identify with being neurodivergent at all?
• 16:34
  Speaker 2: Being what?
• 16:35
  Speaker: Neurodivergent.
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: I have no idea what that is.
• 16:39
  Speaker: Okay.
• 16:39
  Speaker: So people with ADHD and autism sometimes- Yeah have, like, wide varieties and really interesting lives, and are often highly, highly intelligent.
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: Mm-hmm.
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: I might be, uh, have some kind of Asperger or ADHD.
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: I pro- I- Yeah you know, probably I went into critical care because, multitasking is a big, is important.
• 17:03
  Speaker: Mm-hmm.
• 17:03
  Speaker: I recently my last podcast was a monologue, a lot about freedom and the mustangs and what we experienced on the mustang wilderness journey, which was Uh, I don't know how much I told you about it.
• 17:17
  Speaker: We had 210 wild horses circling us within the first hour of our-
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: Oh of our
• 17:23
  Speaker: tr- of our four-day trip, pack trip.
• 17:25
  Speaker: Oh, right.
• 17:26
  Speaker 2: Wow.
• 17:26
  Speaker: And to have these amazing creatures circle us and feel the amount of freedom that they live, it was too much for most of us.
• 17:36
  Speaker: I mean, we didn't know what to do with that emotion and that feeling.
• 17:41
  Speaker: And thinking about interviewing you today and thinking about the movies- and what freedom actually means.
• 17:49
  Speaker: I think at one point in the last podcast I said something about, you know, it's very different to take a wild animal, like a wild orca or a wild horse, and move them into some form of captivity.
• 18:04
  Speaker: Even if they're very happy, even if they're forming relationships with humans.
• 18:09
  Speaker: That's very different than taking, say, a person and putting them in a prison, because my, my analogy was that we're all already prisoners to some degree by the social programming and our own thought process- Mm-hmm and any form of government.
• 18:27
  Speaker: I'm not slamming the current administration right now.
• 18:30
  Speaker: Um, but any- Any overlay-
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: Please do.
• 18:36
  Speaker: Any overlay of human civilization is gonna have some form of control.
• 18:41
  Speaker: And so when we imprison humans, we're taking them from one form of control into another form of control.
• 18:47
  Speaker: Right.
• 18:47
  Speaker: Never, ever really understanding-
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: Right
• 18:50
  Speaker: what true freedom is.
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: We have to do the best we can, you know?
• 18:55
  Speaker: Right.
• 18:56
  Speaker: I-
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: I saw an incredible film, and I wish I could find it.
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: And it was from the master horsemen in Mongolia.
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: You're not considered a master horseman until you're at least 80 years old.
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: And here's what they do.
• 19:12
  Speaker 2: Every year they have a festival where they demonstrate their skills with horses.
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: The master horsemen Go out into the wild, and they bring back six or seven wild mustangs, and at 3:00 there's gonna be a demonstration.
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: At 3:00 they show up to the demonstration.
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: These horses are in parade regalia, including head stuff, saddles, everything, and the demonstration is we're gonna go under this, around that.
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: We're gonna gallop, uh, full speed, I'm gonna pick things up from the ground with my teeth, and then we're gonna go around this thing, under this, over that, around whoa, okay, we're done.
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: Then they bring them back to the edge of the festival, they take up all of their stuff, and they let them go.
• 20:01
  Speaker 2: And as the horses are walking away, they're all walking together nose-to-nose as they walk away.
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: It's like they're talking to each other.
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: It's like,"Ooh, that was different."
• 20:14
  Speaker: I, I've seen that behavior where they put their noses together, and I know- Yeah, yeah,
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: like
• 20:18
  Speaker: when Taylor would go- I know that it's, I know that it's increasing their ability to share pictures and communicate.
• 20:24
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 20:25
  Speaker: In
• 20:25
  Speaker 2: fact, I
• 20:25
  Speaker: had- Yeah I had several, I've talked about this before, but when I was training, uh, Sipsy, the, the gal that liked to freeze, and I'd have my older, uh, very well-trained fox trotter would be loose, and I'd be struggling with some different new concepts with Sipsy, and I'd get kind of frustrated.
• 20:43
  Speaker: I'd say,"Oh, Firefly, could you help out?" Firefly would come over, they would touch noses, be a couple minutes, and then I would try again with Sipsy and she would get it.
• 20:53
  Speaker: And I know, it happened m- a lot more than once, and I know that Firefly was giving her instructions and filling in the blanks for her.
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: Well, in our movie, I don't know if you've watched the whole movie Throwaway Horses, but the trainer paired this one horse with another horse who was severely emotionally damaged, and eventually- Yeah um, it worked out because they trusted each other.
• 21:16
  Speaker: They learn.
• 21:16
  Speaker: They learn from each other.
• 21:17
  Speaker: They form relationships- Yeah too, and they- Yeah they bridge gaps.
• 21:21
  Speaker: I mean, absolutely, all of that.
• 21:23
  Speaker: All of that is true.
• 21:24
  Speaker: So what did you think about Keiko?
• 21:28
  Speaker: A- do you think he missed being free?
• 21:32
  Speaker 2: He didn't ever have it.
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: He was taken when he was three, we think.
• 21:38
  Speaker: Mm-hmm.
• 21:38
  Speaker 2: And he could've still been weaning.
• 21:42
  Speaker 2: And his parents were, he was separated from his parents at a very young age, and so he didn't know any different.
• 21:54
  Speaker 2: Human beings were his pod.
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: So the fact that he was able to get into the wild, go see all the high school, college kids, you know, out in the wild.
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: And the interesting thing that Naomi pointed out was that the adults in those big pods were not threatened by Keiko and allowed their children to play with him.
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: Mm-hmm.
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: Now, that was unusual.
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: He was not a threat.
• 22:26
  Speaker 2: He was not a threat because he never would've been like the whale that ate the trainers at SeaWorld, okay?
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: Dawn Brancheau and all those folks that got near...
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: Uh, she got eaten.
• 22:40
  Speaker 2: Some other people got eaten by Tilikum.
• 22:44
  Speaker 2: There's a whole story around that.
• 22:46
  Speaker 2: Uh, I remember-
• 22:47
  Speaker: Were they, were, were those animal, were those mammals being mistreated?
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: Oh, of course.
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: They're all being mistreated.
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: The reason why the one Tilikum ate his longtime trainer, Dawn, um, is that he was a...
• 23:03
  Speaker 2: K- Keiko was not an alpha male.
• 23:06
  Speaker: Mm-hmm.
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: He was a secondary male.
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: Tilikum is an alpha male.
• 23:10
  Speaker: Mm-hmm.
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: And he had females in that SeaWorld things, and children in different pods that he could never communicate with, never be with, never touch, never be around.
• 23:19
  Speaker 2: Mm-hmm.
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: But he could hear them, okay?
• 23:22
  Speaker 2: And so, whales were trained in much the same way horses are trained, and it was a clicker technique.
• 23:27
  Speaker 2: I can't remember which came first.
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: I think, um, I think it was maybe the whales first, and then the horses started clicker training.
• 23:36
  Speaker 2: But Dawn had gotten much too used to Tilikum, and she asked him to go around, and so he would go around, and then he would get fish as a reward.
• 23:48
  Speaker 2: She ran out of fish, and she kept asking him to go around, and didn't give him a fish.
• 23:53
  Speaker 2: And she did that two or three times.
• 23:56
  Speaker 2: And then she ran over by the steps and said,"Come on over here," and she still didn't have any fish.
• 24:03
  Speaker 2: So he got pissed off.
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: He grabbed her.
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: He ate her arm.
• 24:06
  Speaker 2: He ate a lot of her.
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: Killed her, right then and there.
• 24:11
  Speaker 2: And, I don't remember why I was telling the story.
• 24:14
  Speaker 2: It's just that, um-
• 24:16
  Speaker: It has to do with freedom
• 24:18
  Speaker 2: freedom, and yes, so
• 24:20
  Speaker: And it has to do with treating animals well.
• 24:22
  Speaker: And if they're not free, like what kind of choices do they have?
• 24:26
  Speaker: And-
• 24:26
  Speaker 2: Right
• 24:27
  Speaker: but, but what you brought up, you know, I see the parallels between that and the reason why I am not a proponent of clicker training in horsemanship- Right unless there is a very serious relational development- Right, right first.
• 24:43
  Speaker: If you have a relationship, and then you wanna overlay a little bit of that, but there's a lot of reasons it's a bad idea, because it habituates a behavior based on, if I do this, you do that.
• 24:55
  Speaker: If I do this, you do that.
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 24:57
  Speaker: And eventually you're, there's no reasoning, there's no thinking, there's no relationship.
• 25:02
  Speaker: This woman
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: was insulted, and she had had a relationship with this animal for 10, 15 years, and I think she forgot that he was a wild animal.
• 25:12
  Speaker: Mm-hmm.
• 25:13
  Speaker 2: And that she had just insulted him a million times, two or three times.
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: Totally insulted him.
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: Mm.
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: And it's like, wow.
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: It was intense.
• 25:26
  Speaker: It, it, it was- That's a, that's a, a very severe consequence-
• 25:30
  Speaker 2: Yes
• 25:30
  Speaker: for people to need to, you know, to be able to figure that out.
• 25:34
  Speaker: And-
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: Yes
• 25:35
  Speaker: and you know, like, it brings up the question too, like- So much of what happens in, in, in throwaway horses is that we bring these horses in to domesticate them.
• 25:47
  Speaker: Something goes wrong, whether it's training, personalities, uh, not enough follow-through, lack of funding, whatever the problems are.
• 25:56
  Speaker: And so we end up with horses that perhaps were once wild, maybe not I- in a position where we're not being responsible And it, I, I think the same thing happens with the whales.
• 26:10
  Speaker: You bring them in, you train them, whether they're still kind of wild in their head, whether the training methods are ethical and the best available, you know, all of that's up for...
• 26:19
  Speaker: I mean, everybody's doing the best they can, right?
• 26:20
  Speaker: I mean, I'm not slang- I, I don't know how to train a whale.
• 26:23
  Speaker: I can't sit here and really criticize them.
• 26:24
  Speaker: Well,
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: I think the whales c- accommodate because there was at least something to do.
• 26:28
  Speaker 2: They're in a bathtub.
• 26:29
  Speaker 2: Oh, here's something to do
• 26:30
  Speaker: It's a very small environment
• 26:32
  Speaker 2: Yes, it's a bathtub You know,
• 26:33
  Speaker: that's, that's like you or I being locked in a 10 by 12 room for your entire life Right.
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: Right, and we'll bring you all the food you need, and we'll entertain you, and we'll give you little exercises, but that's it
• 26:46
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 26:47
  Speaker: That's very, very different than having access to a, a measured freedom.
• 26:53
  Speaker: Like, okay, I did a lot of my, my training with Liz Mitten Ryan in British Columbia Mm-hmm And there are, there's a h- a family herd of horses.
• 27:03
  Speaker: They no longer have a stallion when I was there, but I think there were, like, around 30 horses that were free on 320 acres, and they would come in for food, but nobody locked them in.
• 27:13
  Speaker: But yeah, there's a habituation happening.
• 27:16
  Speaker: Breakfast is- Right at 8:00, dinner's at 5:30.
• 27:19
  Speaker: Right You can graze or you can come in,
• 27:21
  Speaker 2: right.
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: Right
• 27:22
  Speaker: And and they had, they had the choice.
• 27:25
  Speaker: And so when those horses hung out with us, they were there by choice.
• 27:30
  Speaker: When I had my larger ranch and I had, you know, wild, I had my goats out there.
• 27:34
  Speaker: I had my cattle out there.
• 27:35
  Speaker: I had my horses out there.
• 27:37
  Speaker: If myself alone or with company went out and wandered on the ranch and the animals came to be with us, it was because they could be anywhere on 200 acres.
• 27:47
  Speaker: And I mean, okay, it's only 200 acres, but they could be anywhere.
• 27:49
  Speaker: But they- Right chose to be there.
• 27:52
  Speaker 2: And- I let, I was told that to allow...
• 27:55
  Speaker 2: You know, I remember one day, T- I used to sing to Tayanne.
• 27:58
  Speaker 2: She would come to me when I called, and then one day she just didn't wanna come.
• 28:02
  Speaker 2: And the trainer said,"She doesn't wanna come today.
• 28:05
  Speaker 2: Let that be okay.
• 28:06
  Speaker 2: Don't go get her."
• 28:08
  Speaker: Right
• 28:08
  Speaker 2: She isn't choosing to come to you today." And the next day I came, she came running.
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: I better have something interesting to do.
• 28:14
  Speaker: Right Or, or- I mean, and sometimes it's just about I have no agenda.
• 28:18
  Speaker: I just wanna- Yeah be with you.
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 28:23
  Speaker 2: Yeah She had a torn meniscus as a baby.
• 28:28
  Speaker 2: Her daddy was 18, 19 hands.
• 28:30
  Speaker 2: Her mother was 14 hands.
• 28:33
  Speaker 2: She was pulled out with a winch, I didn't know this, and she was breech.
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: So when they pulled her out, they tore her meniscus, so she was never a We, we started putting her in her saddle, but she started falling all the time.
• 28:45
  Speaker 2: So she can't be ridden.
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: She's been ridden by well-advanced trainers.
• 28:50
  Speaker: Mm-hmm.
• 28:50
  Speaker 2: She's been out on trail walks and that sort of thing.
• 28:53
  Speaker 2: But my relationship with her is trail walks.
• 28:56
  Speaker: What, d- I mean, and that's a beautiful thing.
• 28:58
  Speaker: Like, one of my- Right ve- very early podcasts is with Kimberly Dunn, who advocates w- walking with I mean, you learn so much.
• 29:07
  Speaker: With the- Oh, yes the woman, the woman I consider the grandmother of equine-assisted practices, L- Linda Kohanov, h- all of her discoveries happened when her horse was lame and she started walking with it.
• 29:19
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: I learned so much on Matea'cause we'll be going along and she'll get upset about something and, and then I let her be upset, not crazy, but upset.
• 29:29
  Speaker 2: And let's figure out what that is.
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: Oh, you see something.
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: Let's Show me.
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: And then she'll show me, and I'll go,"Oh, it's okay." And then she has to get convinced that it's okay.
• 29:39
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: And okay, it's okay.
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: All right.
• 29:43
  Speaker 2: But that's a lot of listening.
• 29:46
  Speaker: It is.
• 29:46
  Speaker: A
• 29:46
  Speaker 2: lot of listening that we're not used to.
• 29:48
  Speaker 2: We all wanna be control freaks, and it's oh, my God.
• 29:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 29:52
  Speaker 2: Came from a critical care background.
• 29:54
  Speaker: Well, what's, what's the-
• 29:54
  Speaker 2: Massive control
• 29:56
  Speaker: right.
• 29:56
  Speaker: What's the difference between control and stewardship?
• 30:01
  Speaker 2: Just everything we've been talking about.
• 30:03
  Speaker 2: Listen, I think it has to do with listening-
• 30:06
  Speaker: Mm-hmm
• 30:06
  Speaker 2: so the stewardship is about learning to listen, I think, and being able to follow through intelligently, understanding the k- the, the body language, the communication.
• 30:17
  Speaker: Mm-hmm.
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: You know, standing next to Taya, she stands there next to me, and if you were just to observe her, you would think there's nothing going on.
• 30:27
  Speaker 2: She's a little Miss Chatty Cathy.
• 30:29
  Speaker 2: She's talking to me constantly, and I know it because I've been with her for 25 years, but you wouldn't know that standing, us standing next to each other.
• 30:39
  Speaker: Tell me more about her talking to you.
• 30:40
  Speaker: What does that mean?
• 30:42
  Speaker 2: Well, I, I, that's a, a loosely used word.
• 30:46
  Speaker 2: She's communicating with me constantly.
• 30:48
  Speaker: With pictures?
• 30:51
  Speaker 2: Body language.
• 30:54
  Speaker 2: Maybe a lean- Mm-hmm or a movement of the head, and then it'll go-
• 30:59
  Speaker: She said the micro, the micro movements.
• 31:01
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 31:01
  Speaker: You're reading her micro movements, and part of
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: her-
• 31:03
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 31:03
  Speaker: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 31:04
  Speaker: I know.
• 31:04
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 31:04
  Speaker: I know what you mean.
• 31:06
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 31:07
  Speaker: Yeah, my horse
• 31:08
  Speaker 2: is- Never had a word for it before, so micro movements is correct.
• 31:11
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: Because she has to read my, my micro movements and her micro movements correctly,'cause her survival depends on it, so does mine.
• 31:19
  Speaker: But they also, they also read intention.
• 31:22
  Speaker: Yes.
• 31:22
  Speaker: They also have the largest limbic system of any m- land mammal.
• 31:27
  Speaker: Right.
• 31:27
  Speaker: So they're in tune with our emotions, they know what our intention is.
• 31:30
  Speaker: Big
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: time.
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: They're reading- Big time
• 31:31
  Speaker: they're reading our heart rate, they're reading your breath rate.
• 31:34
  Speaker: Yes.
• 31:34
  Speaker: They know you.
• 31:35
  Speaker: Yes.
• 31:35
  Speaker: And I occasionally get actual words, and sometimes when I- they can't get it across to me, they'll act things out.
• 31:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 31:45
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 31:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I, I...
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: That's exactly my experience too.
• 31:48
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 31:48
  Speaker: A- and all of it is listening.
• 31:51
  Speaker 2: And you don't receive it unless you do listen.
• 31:53
  Speaker 2: You don't, you don't notice it, you don't see it.
• 31:55
  Speaker 2: Because animals, you know, I live up next to for- to a forest, and we...
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: I've become a bird watcher.
• 32:03
  Speaker 2: Because we have everything from tiny little bushtits that are about this big, to hawks.
• 32:08
  Speaker 2: I had the most unique experience about two or three weeks ago where two baby screech owls had just fledged, and I, I got this all on film and I put it on my Facebook page.
• 32:21
  Speaker 2: Because they had just fledged just then, and they came down to our little water feature.
• 32:26
  Speaker 2: It has a little bubbler in it.
• 32:28
  Speaker 2: And then there was this very young squirrel who was also pretty new, and they were all at the water feature.
• 32:36
  Speaker 2: And then the, the screech owl, you know how they turn their heads, it turned around, looked at me, you know, and then looked back.
• 32:42
  Speaker 2: And, and the screech the chip, ch- the squirrel didn't realize,'cause he was so young, he didn't realize that he's food for these two screech owls, and the screech owls were so young they didn't realize that he was food, and they all were in there taking a bath together.
• 32:59
  Speaker 2: And it was like, wow, that's how we're all when we first get here.
• 33:04
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 33:05
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 33:05
  Speaker: There's, there's
• 33:06
  Speaker 2: a- I've got all of that on film.
• 33:07
  Speaker 2: It's crazy
• 33:10
  Speaker: There, there, there's an innocence to that, but there's also even- From what I've witnessed with animals, a, a real acceptance of the order of things
• 33:21
  Speaker 2: Yeah
• 33:22
  Speaker: Even when you are f- I mean, we, I sometimes...
• 33:24
  Speaker: I am kind of vegetarian sometimes, but I get a little frustrated with vegetarians and vegans that you know, get on kind of a moral thing about it, because the plants that they're eating, they have feelings too.
• 33:38
  Speaker: Yes.
• 33:38
  Speaker: And we all gotta, we all gotta eat some- True we all gotta eat something.
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 33:43
  Speaker: So, y- you know, but your story about the squirrels and the owl reminded me of years ago before I had horses, we had some cattle and we had a, a livestock trough, and it was under a big fir tree.
• 33:55
  Speaker: There were s- quite a few trees under where this, this stock tank was, and it was a metal stock tank with that rim.
• 34:03
  Speaker: And there were little owls, and they weren't spotted owls, but they're- Ooh another type of s- of small owl that was like a spotted owl.
• 34:10
  Speaker: And it was during this whole spotted owl thing.
• 34:11
  Speaker: It was in the'90s.
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 34:13
  Speaker: And there was a squirrel, and he would not shut up one morning.
• 34:20
  Speaker: And the next day I went out there, and there was a drowned owl.
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: Oh.
• 34:25
  Speaker 2: He wanted your...
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: He was trying to tell
• 34:27
  Speaker: you.
• 34:27
  Speaker: He was warning.
• 34:28
  Speaker: He was like,"Help.
• 34:30
  Speaker: Help, help.
• 34:30
  Speaker: Help, help." Yes.
• 34:32
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 34:32
  Speaker: And we all try to stick, a stick in there now so critters can get their way out.
• 34:37
  Speaker: Can grab
• 34:37
  Speaker 2: onto it, yeah.
• 34:38
  Speaker 2: But,
• 34:38
  Speaker: you know, there's so many times when I'm in the forest too, and I know the squirrels are sounding the alarm for the birds.
• 34:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 34:46
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 34:48
  Speaker 2: Yeah, they help each other.
• 34:49
  Speaker: They do.
• 34:49
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 34:50
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 34:51
  Speaker: There's an order.
• 34:53
  Speaker: There's a whole order out there of wild things.
• 34:56
  Speaker: It has been a pleasure getting to talk to you
• 34:59
  Speaker 2: thank you.
• 35:00
  Speaker: I'm so impressed with all the things that you have done,
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: thank you.
• 35:04
  Speaker: Bye.
• 35:04
  Speaker 2: Bye.