Conservationist Charlotte Faulkner is firing contraceptive darts at hill ponies on Dartmoor in a battle to save their existence.
The unusual move is the latest attempt to control the number of new-born moorland ponies each year.
If the scheme to dose 300 mares proves effective, the sight of Ms Faulkner, founder of the Dartmoor Hill Pony Association, roaming the uplands, rifle in hand, could become a regular annual occurrence.
She is quick to point out that she doesn't simply take pot shots at random – the owners of each and every target must agree – and the creatures hardly feel a thing.
"They just bounce forward and carry on eating, as if they had just had a bee sting," she said.
"It has been brought over from America and uses an infra-red beam to judge the distance so you don't overshoot or hit them too powerfully – their welfare has been really carefully worked out.
"Everything is about making it the very best as we can do it and it seems to be working very well."
The native ponies – not to be confused with their pure-bred Dartmoor cousins – are an essential part of the ecology of the 368-square mile national park in Devon by keeping the gorse on the moorland under control.
But their numbers have declined from over 25,000 in the 1930s to around 1,000 today.
But with ponies selling for as little as £10 at auction, they have been left to breed unchecked and there are now fears of overpopulation.
Each year the animals are driven off the moor for their annual health check, weaning and sorting for either forthcoming sales or to be returned to the moor.
Many are rounded up for sale at the annual drift sale in Devon with around 150 sold at Chagford market last year.
But the auction was the only traditional sale in 2014 following the cancellation of the Tavistock event.
Efforts to find homes for the ponies took on a modern twist last summer with the launch of a website – wildtowonderful. org – which shows photographs of foals and allows people to bid and buy online.
But key to maintaining the tradition of ponies on the moor is controlling the numbers
The project has been given serious consideration – Ms Faulkner has undergone formal training in "immobilisation and live capture" in order to carry out each operation.
Each gas-fired dart contains a dose of the drug Improvac, a much cheaper and longer-lasting way to prevent mares becoming pregnant than the old system of injections – and much easier to deliver.
Once the pony has been dosed a sharp-eyed assistant needs to retrieve the tiny dart.
The animal's tails are trimmed back to mark them out in the autumn – creating a new cottage industry making craft items with the hair to help pay for the medicine – though Ms Faulkner claims to recognise most of them anyway.
"The Dartmoor Commoners council has a recognised and valued welfare officer who supports the pony keepers caring for the ponies on the moor and this just another tool to help," she added.
"At the moment there is a problem – we need the ponies to look after the habitat but the by-product of that is foals – we need the stallion to keep the mares in the right place and this is the end result.
"We now have about 100 on this drug but we won't know the final result of the trial until May."
The charity founder sparked controversy last summer by suggesting some of the ponies be sold for human consumption – or risk their loss from the moor altogether.
This followed the revelation in 2013 that unwanted Dartmoor ponies were being slaughtered and fed to lions and tigers in zoos and their hides were being crafted into "wild pony" drums.
Ms Faulkner said she believes herders will only continue to keep the animals if there is a "sustainable market" for them.
The initiative has been backed by Exmoor Pony Society and the Exmoor National Park Authority. But it drew a furious response from another charity dedicated to the welfare of ponies.
Comments have also been made by South West Equine Protection (SWEP) who said it would never support over breeding.
