Wild Horses: Come to the Wyoming Statewide Hearing 6/21 and Voice your Comments about this Summer’s Roundups
June 7, 2011
Wild Horses: Has the BLM come to its senses about spaying wild mares and sterilizing 2 herds in WY?
June 17, 2011Wild Horses: “D” is for Destroy, Devastate and Decimate – the BLM’s plan for Wyoming’s Wild Horses
White Mountain Wild Horses
This morning the Rock Springs, Wyoming BLM office published a Decision Record for the White Mountain and Little Colorado Herd Areas.
Here it is:
Normally these decision records come as no surprise – despite thousands of comments from the public against the roundup, (over 7000 in this case) usually the Alternative A is chosen, what the BLM wanted all along: bringing the herd numbers down to the lower end of AML, using birth control on the mares, and more recently, a crude twist – skewing the sex ration favoring stallions over mares.
Not this time.
In a shocking move the BLM has chosen alternative D for these two herds. This is what is listed in on page 8 in the the Environmental Assessment as Alternative D:
“Remove All Animals and manage for a non-reproductive herd returning gelded and spayed wild horses to Lower Limit of AML range.”
Even more alarming here is the last paragraph:
“The populations in the White Mountain and Little Colorado HMAs would be managed as non-reproducing herds. The population would be monitored and the population would be supplemented with wild horses from other HMAs as needed. In the case where all of the reproducing horses are not initially captured or people illegally turn out reproducing domestic horses into the HMAs a future gather action would be necessary to gather excess wild horses to the low AML.”
Mare and Foal in White Mountain
What is really ironic is that the White Mountain Herd is one of the most popular and easily visited herds in Wyoming, only 14 miles north of Rock Springs, and it even has a “Loop Tour!”
You can read the entire EA here:
These two herds will be managed to extinction in August. This is the blueprint for the erasure of the wild horse herds from Wyoming, and by extension, across the West.
I am not even going to go into detail about how unspeakably cruel and ridiculously expensive it will be to spay wild mares.
You may ask, what can I do about this? The very first thing you should do is get the word out about this atrocity. There is a meeting, a statewide hearing on the use of helicopters and motorized vehicles in the management of wild horses on June 21 at 5:30 at the BLM office in Rock Springs. Go and speak out if you can attend.
Here are the details:
http://www.blm.gov/wy/st/en/info/news_room/2011/may/18hdd-helicopter.html
If you cannot make it and want to speak out for Wyoming’s wild horses, here are a list of phone numbers that you can call:
Wyoming State Wild Horse Specialist Amy Ruhs, 307-352-0375,
Rock Springs Wild Horse Specialist Jay D’Ewart, 307-352-0331
High Desert District Manager: John Ruhs 307-352-0256
Wyoming State Director: Don Simpson 307-775-6256.
Please call and email your Congressmen and Senators about this.
Family Band from Great Divide Basin
The next herd on the schedule for roundup and removal is Great Divide Basin, and comments are due by June 20. I think it is a safe bet that Alternative D will be the one that Wyoming’s BLM will opt for. Please comment here:
Thank you for caring about our wild horses. I invite you to act so that the wild horses of Wyoming do not become only a memory.
These beautiful horses deserve to stay in their families and in their homes
Here is the Press Release from the Cloud Foundation – please pass this along:
15 Comments
I CANNOT BELIEVE THIS. IT IS THE MOST STUPID, HATEFUL, CRUEL, AND MORE THAT I HAVE EVER HEAR OF. THEIR ONE OBJECTIVE IS THE DESTRUCTION OF ALL THE HERDS. THIS AGENCY MUST BE STOPPED. NOT ONLY WILL IT DESTROY THE HERDS BUT IT WILL DESTROY A LOT OF JOBS FOR THE PEOPLE THAT WORK FOR THE BLM. THE PEOPLE OF AMERICA HAVE NO RIGHT ANYMORE. LETS REMEMBER THAT WHEN WE VOTE NEXT YEAR.
Something else we can thank our dear president for.
He has mess with ssi checks, medicare, medicade,
Now with my dearest love, the wild horse. He
Wants to take away our soles slowly but surely.
What does that tell you! We must fight to keep
the mustang wild and free.
I just received an email from Joe Biden who has been appointed “Sheriff Joe” to make cuts in the tax structure. We all need to bombbard him with emails on the cost of our tax dollars being spent on something that is just ridiculous. We need to get this stopped. The BLM just gets more ridiculous everyday. I swear they have a bad case of dementia.
This will kill a lot of the mares. We already know many stallions are killed whenthey are gelded. Not only that this [procedure is outdated and dangerous even in the best clinics. Now laparoscopic spaying is done–not ovarietomies. Futhermore there won’t be any OTHER horses left to bring into these herds. This is genocide.
[…] from Carol Walker as it appears at Wild Hoofbeats […]
I am 64 years old and when I was a girl 10 years of age, the BLM came into the remote forest where I lived and ran a small herd of horses into the barbwire fences. They were relentless. Broken bones and torn briskets were the end for horses 54 years ago.
Once again it was to remove a small herd of horses…no more than 12, to make way for the cattle grazing. I hated the BLM then and it appears as though they are still very ruthless when it comes to horses. The whole department needs to be abandoned and turned over into the Forest Service. The two departments basically have the same responsibilties and the Forest Service does a much better job. Bad Land Management would be eliminated and that would be just fine with me. Everything they do is f’d up.
I am so sick and tired of BLM’s rounding up all the wild horses despite the objections of the public. They are continuing to take the horses from the Nevada ranges to the point they are nearly gone. When it is going to end? Also, who benefits from these wild horses being removed from the range? The cattle ranchers who think they own the land, or the hunters that get their kicks out of killing wild life. Not everyone wants to eat dead cows or dead wildlife. These roundups are animal cruelty at its highest level. They stampede mares, foals and all the other horses over such rugged terrain, that many of them simply drop dead from the stress. We, as horse owners would never subject our horses to such cruelty.
Come on America, how can you let this happen???? Please contact your Senators and House Reps. and tell them you want them to STOP THE BLM!!!! We must stop them before all the wild horses are gone. The BLM knows they might loose funding next year so they will do all the damage they can before then. Please make some calls and see your Congressmen and women.
Looks like, if they can’t slaughter them into distinction, the BLM will just make it so no more are born. This will definately kill some of the horses, both mares and stallions, another way to eliminate them. The sentence, will bring other Mustangs if the herd goes underlimit…. yeah right!!!
When are they going to STOP destroying such a beautiful animal. They need to let them roam free as they were promised. We are waisting so much of our tax dollars to ultimately destroy all of the Mustang herds and there will be no heritage left. This is cruel and inhumane, just leave them alone and nature will take care of them. WE need to stop all of these rediculous acts against the wild Mustangs. Our tax dollars need to be spent on things and issues that are so needed.
I live for the day the BLM and Secretary of the Interior, Ken Salazar, have fallen into oblivion in their quest to provide the wild horses’grazing lands for private herds of a few western cattle ranchers. Obama could put a stop to these wild horse round-ups but horses can’t vote. We, however, can vote and we need to remember Obama’s non-protection of the horses and burros at the voting booth in 2012. Salazar was a cattle rancher before Obama hand-picked him for Interior Secretary and, therefore, his interests lie only with ranchers. In my opinion, Salazar is the worst Interior Secretary that has ever been appointed. The wild mustangs have been in this country far longer than cattle. I despise this administration for only listening to the vested interests of ranchers and not the voice of the American taxpayers who support the wild mustangs.
Can we get another petition for this?
We need to call our Senators and Congressmen and protest this and those who can, go to the June 21 Hearing in Rock Springs, WY. There is a new gas field going into these two herd areas – no coincidence.
I think we need something BIGGER! GODDD?????
Carol – you are absolutely right on – no coincidence (gas and more) about what is going on in WY. Headline news tonight – Our debt ceiling is running out of time – and here we have Salazar under Obama’s watch being allowed to “D” destroy, devastate and decimate our Wild Horses at the taxpayers expense. There is more to the extermination of our wild horses than we will ever know…perhaps when we become a nation that cannot meet its obligations and the American public demands accountability of reasons for our failure we will then be able to stand tall and be proud. In the meantime. I will continue to fight for my equine friends.