A model of caring

Ron Medvescek / Staff
Heather Chase, founder of Models With Conscience, is a Tucson-based model and author whose group promotes the use of products developed without animal research and which do not contain animal byproducts. Chase likes to "snuggle and cuddle" with her horse, an activity that's "good for my heart."

International group's founder a Tucson-based advocate for all creatures

Heather Chase, an only child, grew up with kittens for playmates.

Those early bonds enhanced her innate love of animals. It wasn't until she saw a neighbor beating his dog that Chase realized not everyone shared her views about animals.

Those early childhood events shaped her decision to become an advocate for all creatures. Four years ago, the Tucson-based model and author founded Models With Conscience, an international group of models of various ages, sizes and nationalities dedicated to promoting animal-friendly products and causes. MWC is not an agency. It takes no money for recommending its models to companies that do not test products on animals or use animal byproducts in their cosmetics, household goods, foods or clothing lines.

MWC also operates a Web site that offers options for consumers who want to maintain a compassionate lifestyle, Chase said. MWC has 30 members from the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, Israel and Canada.

To further educate the public, Chase wrote a book, "Beauty Without the Beasts: A Guide to Cruelty-Free Personal Care" (Lantern Books, $15). It is a primer for anyone interested in adopting the habits MWC promotes.

Now she is working on a book titled "Heroes of Hope," offering "profiles of 16 heroes from recent history who helped the world through nonviolence," she said.

Because Chase and her husband, Ken Beller, often travel, they have no house pets now.

"It wouldn't be fair to have a pet at home," Beller said. They do have a horse, though, boarded with a trainer on the far- West Side of town. Smart Lil' Satch is a 6-year-old sorrel quarter horse gelding with a coat that glistens a brilliant orange-brown in the morning sun. About four times a week, the two come out to ride Satch.

"We got him mostly for his mellow disposition," Chase said. "When you ask him to go, he goes full blast, and 30 seconds later he's almost asleep."

Beller and Satch enter reining and working-cow competitions, which require rider and horse to perform a series of maneuvers and move a cow around an arena in a specific pattern. The competitions do not include any calf roping or rodeo-type wrangling, Beller and Chase are quick to point out.

"She gives him fun; I give him work," Beller said.

"I just like to snuggle him," Chase added. "It's wonderful for me to have a companion animal. I'm using my mind so much (writing and working on Models With Conscience). It's a very mental way of helping animals, and I can come out here and snuggle and cuddle with him, and it's good for my heart.

"Through my whole life, as a toddler being an only child, cats were my siblings. I really bonded with animals from an early age. When I grew up and realized some people didn't feel the same, it really hurt my heart."

Chase has less experience riding than her husband, so she prefers a slower pace when taking Satch into the arena.

"I completely trust him," she said. When Chase is atop Satch, "he just kind of plops around the arena like a pony ride."

Soon Satch will have company in the stable. Chase's aunt in Colorado is sending her a 14-year-old thoroughbred named Baby Girl so the couple can go on trail rides together.

"It's so nice to come out here and reconnect with the animals and nature," Chase said as she leaned against the arena fence and watched Beller put Satch through his paces.

* Send suggestions for pet stories to reporter Kimberly Matas at kmatas@azstarnet.com or call 807-8431.