New wild horse ‘Arlo’ becomes a living tribute to Greybull man’s memory

Colt 2605 of the McCullough Peaks wild horse herd has been nicknamed “Arlo,” after one of Greybull’s own. The colt Arlo was born April 1 into the Red Point group, which usually hangs out on the western side of McCullough Peaks Herd Management Area around Whistle Creek Road. This is also near mile marker 77 on Highway 14/16/20 between Greybull and Cody, where Arlo Averett passed away in 2023. 

“It’s an absolutely wonderful tribute to Arlo, came out of nowhere,” Averett’s mother, Kelly Averett, said. 

Arlo Averett was a graduate of Greybull High School. He enjoyed hunting, shooting, hiking and camping and dreamed of joining the military one day. Before his death, he was training to be an EMT. 

On Oct. 29, 2023, Averett was driving east on Highway 14/16/20 at about 1:25 a.m. when his truck left the roadway and crashed into a delineator pole. In attempting to get back on the road, Averett lost control of the vehicle, which slid sideways about 150 feet before rolling several times. Averett passed away at 24 years old, leaving behind his daughter Harlow Averett, girlfriend Ashley Mayer, and parents James and Kelly Averett. 

“It’s devastating. I think about his little girl all the time and how he’s not here for her... It’s a terrible thing, because he had so much going for him,” Kelly Averett said. Now, they will be able to show Harlow the horses as another reminder of her dad on the drive to Cody. 

Phyllis Preator, a longtime volunteer with the wild horses, started naming them in 2002 as part of a new PZP fertility program to manage the herd population. In her book, “Facts and Legends: Behind the McCulloch Peaks Mustangs,” Preator explained that she was asked to record data on seven focal research harems to determine if PZP would affect behavior. 

“Naming had become a necessity to make it easier for us to communicate with each other about individual horses. The names were also a necessity for identifying individual horses and their behavior on the USGS data charts that we were using. Without names, our work would have been almost impossible,” Preator wrote. 

During wild horse roundups, Preator and others were able to identify which horses needed to be turned back out by name. After 2004, all horses left on the range were given a name, which has helped track the horses’ lineages for genetic diversity, too. Eventually, Preator worked to share the horse’s names with photographers and other wildlife enthusiasts so that everyone could refer to them by the same name. 

“When we first started applying those names, I never dreamed they would become a ‘legacy’ to the world,” Preator wrote. “Today, the names are sought after by the many visitors of the area. And now, with social media’s many platforms, the names have become golden nuggets in a gold pan. It’s a rush to see who can be the first to grab a new name and give it worldwide recognition.”

The colt Arlo is a Bay with a white star, born to Kodiak, which came from Spirit Walker. About a week ago, Kelly Averett said her niece went out to try and see him, and the herd was right near the road. 

“They called it, and it actually looked at them and started walking towards them,” she said.