美国国家公共电台 NPR Amid Growing Threats, Donkey Rescuers Protect The Misunderstood Beasts Of Burden

LULU GARCIA-NAVARRO, HOST:

Let us now consider the donkey. They have been beasts of burden for 5,000 years, and they haven't gained much respect over the millennia 1. In the wild, burro herds 3 are a nuisance. In captivity 4, they can be mistreated. But now donkey sanctuaries 5 are springing up, and NPR's John Burnett visited the world's largest.

JOHN BURNETT, BYLINE 6: At Peaceful Valley Donkey Rescue outside of San Angelo, Texas, the air periodically erupts with unappeasable sounds.

(SOUNDBITE OF DONKEY BRAYING)

BURNETT: Just like it's heehaw, so much about the donkey is species-specific? Their temperament 7 - intelligent, cautious and playful - is unique in the equine world. Males and females are called jacks 9 and jennies, and they're widely misunderstood.

MARK MEYERS: They assume that they're stubborn. They assume that they're stupid.

BURNETT: Mark Meyers is founder 11 and executive director of Peaceful Valley Donkey Rescue.

MEYERS: So there's a very negative connotation out there - you know, the Bugs 12 Bunny turning into a donkey when he did something stupid; cowboys ride horses. It was the little Mexican sidekicks that rode the donkeys.

BURNETT: Meyers has become America's foremost donkey defender 13. Bored with the electrical contracting business in Southern California, he and his wife, Amy, began adopting unwanted and abused donkeys. After they had accumulated 25 animals, Meyers decided 14 to protect donkeys full time and opened the ranch 15 seven years ago out here in hot, dry West Texas. When Meyers, a burly, white-bearded Buddhist 16, walks into a pen, he's mobbed by love-hungry donkeys.

MEYERS: These donkeys here are some of our ambassador donkeys. This is Buddy 17 and Houdini. We do different public outreach events.

BURNETT: At any given time, his paddocks are home to a thousand of the noisy, big-eared beasts.

(SOUNDBITE OF DONKEY BRAYING)

BURNETT: Peaceful Valley and its network of private sanctuaries has grown into the largest donkey rescue organization in the world, sheltering some 3,000 animals. Half are wild burros removed from public lands. Half are abandoned, abused or neglected. But the idea is not to run a home for old donkeys. The idea is to find them new homes. The ranch gives up more than 400 donkeys a year for adoption 18 because their new owners say they make great pets.

MELISSA SCHURR: Hi, Buck 19. Hi. You're going to talk to us? You want a cookie?

BURNETT: Melissa Schurr is an equine dentist who lives on a ranch outside of Sacramento, Calif. Meyers helped her adopt a 21-year-old spotted 20 Jack 8 named Buckaroo. In his early years, he was a wild ass 10 in Arizona.

SCHURR: Donkeys are very dog-like creatures. They're loyal. They're sweet. It's like a really smart dog, a border collie, and the best horse you ever had wrapped up into one animal.

BURNETT: The Bureau of Land Management estimates there are more than 13,000 wild burros on public lands in five Western states. But thousands more are uncounted. Some semantics - donkeys are domesticated 21; burros are wild. Feral populations can become a nuisance. They foul 22 springs, overgraze, trample 23 the ground and drive away native animals. Kevin Goode of Texas Parks and Wildlife says in the outback, burros are wild animals.

KEVIN GOODE: They are very skittish 24. They're very smart, as all burros are. They are very aggressive, both towards humans and other animals. They don't play well with others.

BURNETT: In the old days, people shot bothersome burros. Today land managers typically tolerate them until the herd 2 gets so big it has to be removed. The animals then have to be gentled up before they can be adopted. Later this month, Peaceful Valley Donkey Rescue will send trailers, wranglers 25 and herding 26 dogs to Ajo, Ariz., to capture some 500 donkeys that have wandered over from Mexico onto public grazing land.

Crossing the border may have saved their lives. The U.K.-based animal rights group Donkey Sanctuary 27 reports that Mexico is one of 21 countries that slaughters 28 donkeys and exports their hides to China, which uses them to make traditional medicine. Mark Meyers says more donkeys and burros are being sold to so-called kill buyers in the U.S. and then exported to Mexican slaughterhouses to feed the insatiable global skin trade.

MEYERS: China has increased the demand for donkey hides to 4 million a year. They've decimated their own donkey herds. They've decimated several African nation donkey herds, and so now they've turned to South America and Mexico.

BURNETT: So the people at Peaceful Valley Donkey Rescue believe their work is more urgent than ever.

(SOUNDBITE OF DONKEY BRAYING)

BURNETT: John Burnett, NPR News, San Angelo.