More Than Mustangs… Do Roundups Really Threaten Wild Horses?

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Do gathers really threaten wild horses & burros? Yes, but beyond the scope of keeping them simply at appropriate management levels….

To clarify, not by the various small regional/state BLM… the ‘worker bees’, but rather the “queen bee” better known as the government level BLM (Bob Abbey & office) acting as “right hand”, and DOI (Ken Salazar). How and why: We’ve lost over [conservatively] 20 MILLION herd management acres (part of the original 54 million set aside for mustang management) and since year 2000 alone, lost over 40% of our mustangs. CORRELATION? The federal government in this struggling economy has one quest and one focus – land and money. They’ve set their sights on the last remaining wild open spaces of our west for ‘green energy’ farms, development, and natural resource exploitation and wild horses, who may one day have better protection (through the will of the people), roam there. Wild horses and burros are simply a road block to what they call progress. Green energy is good, but must be more planful… not “government graffiti” on pristine high deserts or our western rangelands, with fascinating ecosystems and beautiful vistas.

The government uses propaganda of over-populated and starving horses to the trusting public to justify removals (yet these same officials then suggest euthanizing these thousands of horses in long term care), and in the case of last winter’s deadly roundup of Calico Mt. Complex in Nevada, (leaving over 100 mustangs dead associated with the roundup or post care)… and following the removal of around 2,000 horses, increased cattle grazing by 300%. We have documented proof all over our west in all HMAs of horses per herd management area which are thriving by many photographers, from professionals to novice. Also, contrary to BLM established annual population growth stats of 22-25%, a stat they base on “gathers”, growth is actually only 10% for birth rates – per the independent NAS, National Academy of Sciences. There are also mortality rates to consider as well. Should an HMA be less then ideal in forage and water for the year, naturally birth rates drop further, and mortality increases. Part of nature, a balance. However, because of the shrinking “wild” west, management will always be necessary (but by alternatives such as temporary remote-darting fertility control), but not to this extreme of massive, deadly, and expensive wild horse removals ($1.5-3 million dollars per average roundup). This fiscal year alone, they’ve taken away 12,000 horses leaving us only half (around 20,000 or less) of what is now in long and short term holding facilities (around 40,000 fed and cared for by us annually, now costing tax payers around $64 MILLION). Yet, the government continues their intense mission of removals, and even though there is massive public outcry in this country and the world to stop roundups, they continue on. Unsettling really. Next year the removal schedule as issued by BLM is another 11,000 wild horses taken out of our 10 western states. Our horses. Doing the math and knowing what I know… Yes there is, in my opinion, a considerable threat.

We used to have wild horse protection, known as the 1971 Free-roaming Wild Horse and Burro Act. The Burns Amendment (2004), without public consent or comment, shot wild horse and burro protection full of holes when introduced by Senator Conrad Burns during the holidays and slipped into Appropriations, quickly to be signed by President George Bush on Dec. 6th. And since, the government has been rounding up “our” wild horses like their hair’s on fire. They want to remove as many of your and my horses & burros as possible before any possibility of new restoring protection is set in motion. Alarming and frustrating too, the current ROAM Act (Restore American Mustangs) has been “stalled” in Washington with threat to expire – somehow not surprising. Why would some in government stall it, and hope for expiration? Because one of the stipulations of the language states rightful lands will be returned to wild horse management.

Genetically viable numbers of wild horses in a herd has been determined at 150-200 breeding animals of a given HMA by well respected geneticists in the wild horse/burro community. Low numbers threaten the unique genetics of each band of horses. There are HMAs that fall below that… some HMAs that haven’t been eliminated/zeroed out yet, leaving from 3 in some, 30 or 40 in another varying from place to place to a few hundred, via BLM “arbitrarily” determined appropriate management levels (AML) per herd management area with no scientific review/backing. STAGGERING: Besides the 20-24 Million acres deemed for wild horse management which are now off the books and swallowed up by the federal government, we have to date lost by “zeroing out” 111 herds of our wild horses across the west. “For their own good”? No, for your and my public lands.

I reside and have viewed wild horses in Oregon since 1994, and Oregon I believe has, in my opinion, better management of them than other states. But again, this isn’t about regional BLM personnel, but rather the systematic intent of extermination and a war for our rangelands as issued by the “queen” out east, and carried out by the “worker bees” out west. I do what I do so that I never have to tell our children that we once had wild horses, and that there used to be places out here in our west, where one can see for miles without visual assaults of manmade contraptions and development.

More than mustangs, we have so much at stake.

Sonya, aka Mustang Meg
Be a voice for the voiceless…
www.mustangmeg.com
A Million Voices for Mustangs

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