Wild horses, burros up for adoption Tuesday in Pauls Valley

They'll be looking for something completely foreign to them.

These living legacies of the old West are looking for a warm heart.

The animals are among more than 50 horses and burros that will be offered for adoption Tuesday at the Pauls Valley wild horse holding center.

New owners have taken home mustangs and trained them to do everything from performing in parades to team roping to joining their owners in wild hog hunting, said Pat Hofmann, a federal Bureau of Land Management employee and Pauls Valley center manager.

He said there's a horse for virtually everyone: pretty ones, extra stout ones, yearlings, older ones, all with a variety of aptitudes and skills waiting to be discovered.

“It's kind of like a picture. Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder,” Hofmann said. “A lot of people come out looking for a certain type, and then a horse will come up and let them pet it. That's the horse they fall in love with.”

In an effort to achieve a balance between wild horses and other uses, the BLM rounds up the animals periodically from public land in 10 western states and places them for adoption.

Last year, 535 animals from the Oklahoma, Texas, Kansas and New Mexico horse-holding region found homes.

More than 200 were adopted from the Pauls Valley center, said Paul McGuire, an Oklahoma-based BLM spokesman.

Hofmann and Gary Hughes routinely get eyeball-to-eyeball with the wild mustangs at the Pauls Valley center.