How can the HA be overpopulated with 122 wild horses when the BLM authorizes privately owned livestock equivalent to 832 wild horses in the same area?
Why not confine the ranchers to their base properties in a year-round off season and shift the resources back to the horses?
Or would it be better to get rid of them with ovary-killing pesticides as the advocates recommend?
RELATED: What’s Wrong in this Picture?
The incident started on August 24.
As of August 26, 38 burros have been captured and 38 have been shipped, with none released and no deaths.
The location of the trap site was not given.
Two areas on the California side of the Colorado River are targeted.
RELATED: BLM Approves Another Nuisance Removal Near Cibola-Trigo HMA.
The incident will begin on September 6 according to yesterday’s news release.
Three HMAs in western Idaho are affected.
The capture goal is 220 and the removal goal is 142.
Up to 38 mares will be treated with GonaCon Equine, a fertility control pesticide, and be returned to the area with up to 40 stallions.
Helicopters will push the horses into the traps and operations will be open to limited public observation. (For a discussion of observation difficulties, watch this video.)
Captured animals will be taken to the off-range corrals in Boise.
Gather stats and daily reports should be posted to the Idaho gather page but as of this morning a link has not been added.
The Owyhee HMAs are managed primarily for animal agriculture, denoted by green in the following map, the #1 driver of wild horse removals.
Drilling and mining affect anywhere from a few acres to a few thousand acres while permitted grazing devours entire HMAs and beyond.
RELATED: Owyhee Decision Published.
Dates and locations are given in this BLM news release.
Online attendance was not offered.
The project anticipates, but does not control or evaluate, changes to HMAs affected by the RSGA consent decree.
The West Douglas HA was zeroed out because it doesn’t have enough food for wild horses yet the Twin Buttes Allotment, which overlaps most of the HA, offers 11,550 AUMs per year to livestock!
The 122 horses currently in their lawful home consume 1,464 AUMs per year.
RELATED: BLM to Remove All Remaining Horses from West Douglas HA.
It’s not managed for wild horses due to limited food and water, according to a news release dated August 28, but it’s overlapped by an allotment that offers 82.2 AUMs per year per thousand public acres, equivalent to 6.8 wild horses per thousand public acres.
The HA, listed as West Douglas Creek in the 2023 HA/HMA Report, covers 127,649 total acres, including 122,909 public acres in western Colorado.
The AML is zero.
Most of the horses were removed in a 2021 roundup.
Roughly one out of three died the following year in off-range holding.
Now, they’re coming for the remnant.
The incident, set to begin on September 1, will be carried out with helicopters and will be open to public observation.
It is on the July 13 schedule.
The current population is thought to be 122 according to the gather page.
Captured animals will be taken to the Cañon City off-range corrals, site of the 2022 virus outbreak that proved fatal only to West Douglas horses.
RELATED: How Many Wild Horses Can the West Douglas HA Support?
It’s time to bury the hatchet. Everybody can rally around darting programs.
No more broken necks, shattered legs and deaths due to blindness.
Ranchers can access most of their food and water and the herds won’t bounce back.
There are no voices for the horses in this story by The Nevada Independent about the Antelope-North roundup, not even the advocates.
Livestock in the Antelope Complex (North + South) receive over seven times more forage than the horses.
That resource would support over 6,000 horses, on top of the 789 allowed by plan.
You don’t have a wild horse problem, you have a resource management problem.
Areas identified for wild horses are managed primarily for cattle and sheep.
Overpopulation means they’re trying to reclaim some of their food from the poor ranchers.
Their punishment is to waste away in feedlots, the domain of animal agriculture.
RELATED: Antelope Roundup North Over.
Your host is not sure if the materials were intended for public consumption but the page is working as of this morning.
Links in the following comments include local versions in case the site goes dark.
Of immediate interest is the current agreement [local] between NDA and CAAWH which includes a stipulation for reductions in herd size over the 12-month period, contradicting a goal in the Darting SOP [local] about stabilizing population growth.
Progress reports, monthly and yearly, were posted to a separate page.
The Year 4 Report [local], covering 2022-2023, indicates 1,225 mares received 1,691 doses of PZP, a restricted-use pesticide.
One hundred and forty two foals were born during the period, with two removed and 41 deceased or missing and presumed dead.
With the reduction in birth rates, coupled with the activity of predators, many herd treatment areas experienced a population decline.
With a population of 3,507 confirmed living horses, the birth rate is four percent, too low to sustain the current herd. It is declining as the bureaucrats desire.
A list of approved properties for darting [local] was also provided.
Curiously, the page has a list of training materials, including a link to literature at the Billings School of PZP Darting and Public Deception with password!
The final link to The Pinto Post, a monthly newsletter that covers the incredible work of the many wild horse organizations in the area, is not correct but you can reach it here.
If you’re a nonprofit, which statement will bring in more donations?
1. We’re protecting these innocent animals with immunocontraceptive vaccines.
2. We’re poisoning the mares with restricted-use pesticides.
The first statement will likely fool more donors, while statement #2 is the truth.
If you’d like to see how the advocates market their poisons in western Nevada, including the Virginia Range, go to Wild Nevada.
A debate between Scott Beckstead, director of campaigns for Animal Wellness Action, and Nevada State Senator Ira Hansen will begin at 6:00 PM Pacific time at the Elko Convention Center, according to an EIN news release dated August 25.
The event can be viewed online. Registration is required.
Hansen, a voice for rural areas in the state, led the opposition to SB90 earlier this year.
Beckstead disputes his claims, arguing that substandard conditions on Nevada public lands are caused by hundreds of thousands of cattle and sheep, not wild horses.
A video of the debate will be posted to the AWA YouTube channel.
The advocates wear “Stay Wild” caps to signal their support of the Montana Solution, not the welfare of wild horses.
They’re wiping out breeding populations and snuffing out new life with safe, proven and reversible darting programs, evident in the following video.
The destruction in this case was caused by the Salt River Wild Horse Darting Group, an affiliate of the Campaign Against America’s Wild Horses.
Specializing in nonmotorized removal, they’re trying to take market share from the legacy contractors.
Both groups are desperate for the approval of the bureaucrats and ranchers.
RELATED: Foal-Free-Friday, Women for Pesticides Edition.
A gather page has been created but no dates were given.
The incident does not appear on the latest schedule.
RELATED: BLM Approves Another Nuisance Removal Near Cibola-Trigo HMA.
The incident started and finished on August 23, with 38 horses captured, 24 shipped, 14 released and no deaths.
There were no unaccounted-for animals.
The gather page does not indicate if any of the returned mares were treated with fertility control pesticides.
The pre-gather population was thought to be 66.
The plan was to capture all of them and return a nonreproducing herd back to the HMA.
RELATED: Hog Creek Roundup Delayed by Weather.
The federal government confiscates money from your paycheck and gives it to groups like High Desert Strategies, Piceance Mustangs and the Campaign Against America’s Wild Horses, who poison the mares with ovary-killing pesticides.
They tell you they’re protecting the horses but they’re actually protecting the ranchers.
If you donate your take-home pay to these groups, you’re supporting the same thing.
RELATED: BLM Awards $1 Million for Wild Horse Protection?
The incident was set to begin yesterday but the gather page, just created, says it may start tomorrow.
RELATED: Hog Creek Roundup Announced.
A new project was opened in ePlanning yesterday and an approved CX was copied to the document folder.
There were no opportunities for public comment.
Under the Proposed Action, the only alternative considered, the agency will remove 100 wild burros from the Picacho State Recreation Area and 75 burros from private lands south of Palo Verde, CA.
The incident, to be carried out with baited traps, was prompted by complaints involving property damage and concerns about public health and safety.
It does not appear on the latest schedule.
The National Data Viewer shows the arrangement.
Attachments 1 and 2 in the CX provide details.
Given that both locations are on the California side of the Colorado River, maybe they should be associated with the Chocolate-Mule Mountains HMA?
The HAs are unfit for wild horses and burros, supposedly.
RELATED: BLM to Yank More Horses and Burros from Cibola-Trigo HMA?
Six organizations will receive grants ranging from $77,331 to $468,033 to support the agency’s mission of managing and protecting wild horses and burros on public lands, according to a news release dated August 21.
Four of the programs involve nonmotorized removal.
Two involve educational outreach.
All are anti-horse/pro-ranching.
In Oregon, High Desert Strategies received the lion’s share of the funds for application of fertility control pesticides. They are already doing this. Western Horse Watchers has been unable to find their web site. They may have a presence on socialist media.
In Colorado, Piceance Mustangs received a six-figure shot-in-the-arm to bolster their pest control efforts. The group was featured last month in a story about GonaCon darting. They make no effort to conceal their disdain for wild horses.
In Utah, the Campaign Against America’s Wild Horses will poison the Cedar Mountain mares with an ovary-killing pesticide while collaborating with one of the permittees.
Are you surprised by any of this? They’re all frauds!
As for the lack of predators, they were eradicated years ago by state wildlife agencies and local inhabitants because of their attraction to calves and lambs.
RELATED: New Grants Available for Wild Horse and Burro Management.
Western Horse Watchers Association 