Every ranch has a remuda – a herd of horses from which the ranch hands select their mounts for each day's work. Dunrovin may be the only ranch to have a remuda of horses and professionals, who bring their distinctive personalities, talents, experiences, and skills to Dunrovin adventures.
Dunrovin’s strong commitment to integrating education into all that we do brings us into contact with a wide range of fascinating people from across Montana. We involve scientists, historians, storytellers, ranchers, horsemen, craftsmen, artists, photographers, writers, actors, and “local characters” of all sorts into our expeditions and adventures. You may also ride with members of our equestrian club – each with their own unique story and perspective on Montana to share.
Let our remuda of characters welcome you to Dunrovin, show you their Montana, and leave you with a new circle of Montana friends!
Barbara Jennings brings her southern charms and vast knowledge of Tennessee Walking Horses to help Dunrovin riders prepare their horses for show.
Danielle Lattuga is a writer and consultant who believes that writing and riding are not so different, both part poetry, part sweat. She lends her skills to a variety of aspects at Dunrovin.
Pam Voth is a professional photographer who provides many of the images you see on our website, and also teaches Dunrovin guests how to photograph from the back of a horse.
Brandon Carpenter was born to the breed! For generations, his family has raised and trained Tennessee Walking Horses on their Shepherd, Montana ranch. Brandon is a natural teacher of both horses and humans and leads many horsemanship clinics for Dunrovin.
Diane Friend is a professor of astronomy at the University of Montana. She also mesmerizes Dunrovin guests on the Big Sky at Night Ride, by revealing the mysteries of the night sky as planets rise and stars fall.
Con Ovnicek has never been far from a horse! He is an exceptional horse trainer and riding instructor who hails from Elk, Washington. He travels to western Montana on a bi-weekly basis to mentor students – including Dunrovin guests.
Coe Dolven is a Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor who uses horses in her therapy, when possible. Coe has worked with Dunrovin for years and partners with us to offer a program called Discover Horses.
Laura Bosak is one of Dunrovin’s seasonal wranglers. When she’s not in the Himalaya of Northern India leading a UM field course and working with local communities, she can be found in the mountains of Montana, leading trail rideson her horse, Dandy, and with her dog, Berkley.
Todd Earp is a hunting guide and outfitter who helps Dunrovin guests experience the Great Burn Wilderness Study Area.
Alan Burgmuller just might spend more time in a canoe than on his own two feet. He'll have you floating the beautiful Bitterroot in no time.
Dan Sheppard is the quintessential fly fisherman and hard to find during the fishing season – unless you connect with him through Dunrovin Ranch or The Grizzly Hackle.
John Stevens owns Caffe Frienze and brings his culinary creativity and vast knowledge of wine to Dunrovin for wine tastings, special parties, and fire pit fondue.
Shelley Scott is well known in the Bitterroot River Valley as a great professional horse trainer with a long list of followers who admire her talents for bringing the best out in both horse and rider. She brings her extensive equine education, background, and passion for dressage to Dunrovin for the benefit of all!
Beth Jaffe’s eclectic approach to art as articulated in her Cool Bus Art Studio, her science background, and her close association with nature form the perfect combination to help Dunrovin Ranch build an art program focused on Art in Nature – Nature in Art.
Barbara Jennings
“Barbara’s motto: No hour of life is lost when it's spent in the saddle.”
Barbara Jennings, a native Virginian, relocated west with a corporate career 28 years ago. After a number of years in the heart of Denver, she negotiated a transfer to Montana, where she continued her business career and then retired in 1998.
Love of animals and the outdoors has always been part of Barbara's life, from her grandfather's farm in Virginia, to her current home next to Montana's Lolo National Forest. Deer, elk, wild turkey, and an occasional bear pass through her property. The deer stand alongside the horses for their share of winter hay. Dogs and cats make their home in her home, coming and going at will, enjoying the freedom of rural life in Montana.
“Love for all the animals and in particular, the horses, keeps me close to home and my work on the Dunrovin Ranch.”
Barbara believes that just being with the horses is a daily learning experience and life venture, therefore she spends much of her time with them, whether riding countless miles of trails in The National Forest or in the show ring on her Tennessee Walking Horses. Her commitment to these horses doesn’t go unnoticed: Chance has been recognized as a Montana Tennessee Walking Horse Trail Pleasure Horse of the Year, and Danny has been a Montana Tennessee Walking Horse Liteshod Horse of the Year.
Danielle Lattuga
Choosing a life in Montana is a choice more akin to romance than logic. For me, it includes the allure of wide meadows reflective of the giant sky and mountains that hide secrets in their hearts, where all canyons meet and grip the land. The echo of hoof beats punctuates this choice. My life in Montana is a life guided by landscape and animal, and my relationship to it is as visceral and palpable as my relationship to those whom I love. After 14 years, the romance has become something enduring—even if a certain valley or vista never ceases to tug my soul skyward.
My passion for writing and the natural world brought me here. After almost 5 years in Big Sky, I moved to Missoula and received my Master’s Degree in Environmental Writing at the University of Montana, in 2003. Since then, I’ve worked tirelessly to support my pair of unemployed herding dogs.
I’d ridden horses just a handful of times, but it wasn’t until I met SuzAnne Miller that the hoof beats matched my heartbeat. I am drawn to Dunrovin for many reasons, not the least being the level of care and respect shared with all animals, human and otherwise, who live at or visit this unique ranch.
I come with very little knowledge of horses, but a strong desire to learn their language. Horses provide yet another way of looking at the world and journeying into this magnificent landscape that we are lucky to call home. 
As a partner at Dunrovin, I write for and edit the newsletter and the website that you are currently visiting. I am also working with SuzAnne to grow our events program, and am especially excited about being involved in Dunrovin’s This Montana Place expedition. I am committed also to creating more ways to broaden our wonderful community while maintaining its closeness and attention to the individual. As part of a dynamic remuda, my role will constantly evolve at Dunrovin, which I credit to the fertile ground that brings us together.
Alan Burgmuller
Alan Burgmuller was born and raised in Delaware and spent most every summer in Quebec, Canada or Montana. He was fortunate enough to join a canoeing oriented Boy Scout troop at age 11, where his love of canoe sport was born.
In his mid-twenties, he worked at a summer camp in Pennsylvania, leading canoe trips on the Delaware River. He entered his first canoe race, a 26-mile event, at age 25. Coming in third out of 33 boats, his competitive blood was unleashed. Since then he has competed in over 80 races around North America. He has raced in eight U.S. National Whitewater Slalom Championships, medaling 19 times and was a nine-time National Champion in numerous classes. Alan is also one of a handful of canoeists who has paddled the Grand Canyon.
Alan, his wife and daughter have called Hamilton, Montana home for more than 24 years, where his deep passion for canoeing has grown to include not only whitewater and river running but also canoe sailing, canoe poling and vast array of fun canoe games.
In the late 1990’s he owned The Canoe Company, a rafting, 
canoeing and kayaking guide service. He has been involved in Ravalli County Search and Rescue for over 6 years as a team leader and trainer for the Swiftwater Rescue Team. For the past 11 years, he has worked part time as a guide and instructor-trainer for Montana River Guides.
Alan feels there is nothing better than sharing his life-long passion with others. At Dunrovin, he plans and guides canoe expeditions, tailored to provide our guests with a fun and safe experience on the river; one that will hopefully prove his passion to be contagious.
Shelley Scott
Shelley Scott is a professional horse trainer, riding instructor, and a native of Missoula. Shelley attended Rocky Mountain College in Billings where she earned a Bachelor of Science degree in equestrian science and political philosophy. From there she accompanied her soon-to-be husband John, to Havre, Montana where she earned a Master of Education degree in counseling and development.
Since completing her education in 1994, Shelley has worked full time as a horse trainer and instructor. She began her career working with quarter horse show horses, training and coaching youth and amateur competitors. Shelley now trains western and English show horses and dressage horses. She is passionate about bringing the benefits of dressage to horses and riders of all disciplines.
Shelley lives in Florence with her husband John and twin boys Kailer and Tristan. Shelley and the boys train together in TaeKwonDo where they substantially outrank her. The entire family enjoys skiing, canyoneering, and everything outdoors. Shelley participates as much as possible in her family’s passion for the outdoors but prefers to participate in whitewater racing and rock climbing as a cheerleader only.
Beth Jaffe
Beth Jaffe began studying art as an extracurricular activity in 1984. Her passion for art has been tended like a lone campfire in the deep wilderness ever since. Formal classes being like occasional trips to civilization for supplies, she treated herself to various mediums along the way including traditional technique in bust sculpture, computer animation and graphics (as they were in the early 90's), and scientific illustration. Dappling in quilt making and water color the most, her primary focus on color combinations has always and still remains steadfast.
Born in Pittsburgh, PA, her base camp became upstate NY three years later and remained so until 1988. The Adirondacks, especially the east side of Lake George were her main stomping grounds in inspiration for her formative years. One day on the floor of a high school hallway, a chance encounter with an unrecognized genius in the art of teaching art gave Beth the important knowledge that abstract art is her soul's primary language. She always thought her first language was visualizing abstractions of the natural world. Now she had some tools for translating her inner world to the rest of humanity.
During a brief four years, the gorges of Ithaca, NY and the Plantations at Cornell University gave her sustenance as she readied herself for a big transition to the Rocky Mountain West. 1993 saw her first floating around central Idaho while 1995 saw her finally taking root in Missoula where she lives today. Those young adult years of college, travel and exploration crystallized her self-taught form of meditation by creation.
She calls her works of this form, Sanity Doodles.
Once settled in Missoula, Beth began sharing her love of art with others by volunteering with Very Special Arts of Montana where she assisted in the adults with brain damage weekly class for several years. Later she took up facilitating for Living Art of Montana (using the arts and nature to support healing), showing her art during First Friday Gallery walks, and teaching art to young children at Wildflower Montessori School. Beth's gifts in self healing through process art are treasured by many. With a deep breath of courage she admits to finally being a civilized member of the greater art community. In her exhalation, we hear she's grateful for finding support and kindness there.
In her lifetime, the closest Beth ever came to drawing a horse happened once during Christmas when she was about eight. She drew the back half of a reindeer in an effort to make Santa's sleigh look authentic. She probably would have drawn more had the paper been bigger and/or Santa's sleigh smaller, but she knew the reindeer would have ended up looking too horse-like so she kept the focus on Santa's sleigh. Also, Beth is one of a small few people in the world who really love to be on a horse, yet do not own any horse oriented art of any kind. So while horses haven't been a huge part of her official artistic past or present, she is thrilled to begin a future with Dunrovin Ranch as art partner.
Coe Dolven, L.C.P.C., P.L.L.C.
I am a native Montanan who has lived all over the state and had several different careers. I have been an high school teacher, a 9-1-1 dispatcher, and for the past 24 years a Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor. I started as a counselor at St. Patrick Hospital's Employee Assistance Program and evolved from doing short term counseling and referral to longer term psychotherapy in a solo private practice. My focus on trauma and it's impact has been a constant since my experience at 9-1-1. This interest led me to study Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing or E.M.D.R., an eight phase approach to address trauma), as well as Psychoanalytic Psychodynamic Psychotherapy, together they provide a traditional foundation with a progressive treatment modality. I believe I have THE MOST fascinating job in the world!
The recurrent themes in my life are teaching, trauma and its' effect, and the love of animals. I have always had a passion for horses, like many little girls I wished for a pony under the Christmas tree, but I didn't own one until I turned 50! The story of how this horse came to me when she did, and the journey since her arrival sounds like a made- for- TV movie. It began when I joined a group of counselors to create a “doll” that would represent “self”. Our leader was an art therapist but the majority of us had never done any art work or crafts. Since I didn't enjoy dolls as a child, and always pretended to be a horse, I made a 7 foot by 5 foot papier mache horse. You've heard the expression, “build it and they will come”? Within months of creating this life-like horse, I was presented with the opportunity to rescue a 17 year old mare, Olivia. “Livvy” taught me so much about horses, and much, much, more about myself. It became disappointingly clear that she was un-rideable, so she taught me to persist and find another way to connect with her when the only way I knew failed.
The solution was to move - both geographically and emotionally, from the house of my dreams, to a place 35 miles away with acreage and the possibility of adding to the “herd”. Shortly after the difficult move, our handsome Noche, which means night in Spanish, joined us to keep Livvy company and satisfy my addiction to riding. Together they taught me about relationships and emotions; especially fear, courage, self confidence, and leadership. The incredible journey inspired me to find a way to combine my two passions; psychotherapy and horses. I was determined to share my experience with others, and for two years I trained to be a Certified Equine Interaction Education and Mental Health Professional.
I continue to see clients in a traditional office setting, specializing in depression, anxiety, trauma survival, and many other life transitions. Meet me in the office or meet me at the barn.
