{"id":22887,"date":"2025-04-02T15:05:29","date_gmt":"2025-04-02T21:05:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/montezuma-and-dolores-counties-proactively-plan-for-large-animal-evacuations\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T04:18:59","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T04:18:59","slug":"montezuma-and-dolores-counties-proactively-plan-for-large-animal-evacuations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/montezuma-and-dolores-counties-proactively-plan-for-large-animal-evacuations\/","title":{"rendered":"Montezuma and Dolores counties proactively plan for large animal evacuations"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Dairy
Dairy cows stand in a field outside a milking barn. (Associated Press file photo)<\/span>dur-i-syn<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

Montezuma and Dolores counties are combining forces to create a team that, in case of an emergency, are prepared to evacuate large animals.<\/p>\n

With the help of CSU Extension, the two counties are in the process of creating CART, which stands for Community Animal Response Team. It\u2019ll be staffed with volunteers.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s another Montolores project,\u201d said Montezuma County Emergency Manager Jim Spratlen. \u201cWe\u2019re trying to develop a team so we\u2019re not exchanging business cards in an emergency.\u201d<\/p>\n

What\u2019s more, Spratlen said, of the five counties and two tribes in the southwest corner of the state, there\u2019s not a team like this.<\/p>\n

Dolores County Emergency Manger Keith Keesling said that a few years ago, he realized how Dolores County was \u201cwoefully unprepared\u201d for emergencies involving large animals.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe decided it was time to fix that,\u201d said Keesling.<\/p>\n

On April 22 in the Montezuma County Annex Building at 6 p.m., they\u2019re going to have a presentation on CART to gauge interest and start recruiting volunteers, said Spratlen.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe ag community is all about neighbors helping neighbors. If there was an emergency, I doubt there\u2019d be a lack of people wanting to help,\u201d said Emily Lockard, Montezuma County\u2019s director and agriculture specialist at CSU Extension.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is about preparing and education,\u201d said Lockard.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s some level of personal responsibility in preparing for such an emergency, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you have horses and livestock but don\u2019t own a trailer, what would you do if there was an emergency?\u201d said Lockard.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can ride a horse out, but not sheep,\u201d Keesling added.<\/p>\n

Having a trailer, then, and checking that trailer to make sure its tires are full and floorboards are intact, is part of that education piece; plus, CART volunteers will undergo official emergency management training.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere hasn\u2019t been an incident that\u2019s come up yet to necessitate this. And based on history, hopefully it\u2019s not something we need a lot,\u201d Lockard said. \u201cIt\u2019s proactive.\u201d<\/p>\n

Other counties have \u201cextremely robust\u201d plans for large animal evacuations, but not every Colorado county has one, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cNot even close,\u201d said Lockard.<\/p>\n

\u201cOurs won\u2019t be too complicated,\u201d Spratlen said. \u201cWe just want to make sure people are trained.\u201d<\/p>\n

Plus, summer is coming up, and there\u2019s multiple herds from multiple different ranchers that graze on National Forest Land, said Keesling.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat if there was a forest fire,\u201d he said. \u201cThese are things we think about, that keep us up at night. This team will help.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There\u2019s a presentation coming up on April 22 about the team <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22888,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[837,971,28,60,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-22887","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-dolores-county","tag-emergency-planning","tag-headlines","tag-montezuma-county","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22887","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22887"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22887\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":77889,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22887\/revisions\/77889"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22888"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22887"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22887"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22887"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=22887"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}