An article dated January 4 by SFGate says the Nevada Department of Agriculture is close to announcing a new program, headed by a to-be-announced new hire: a Virginia Range feral and estray horse program manager, who will oversee programs set by Director J.J. Goicoechea and his team.
WARNING: The story contains images of family bands with foals, which will be disturbing to most advocates.
The author claims the Virginia Range is part of the Sierra Nevada, which your host disputes.
The mustangs arrived later in the 1980s and 1990s, according to Goicoechea, who said there were no wild horses in the area in 1984 according to NDA records.
He may be referring to a declaration by the BLM that there were no unbranded and unclaimed horses eligible for protection under the WHB Act.
But that doesn’t mean the Virginia Range was a horse-free area. We know that horses were present because of Velma’s encounter in 1950.
Further, the declaration may have pertained only to public lands administered by the BLM, which represent a third or less of the total landmass.
The Virginia Range covers almost 300,000 acres, not 2,800 acres as stated in the report.
NDA already hired a VRE program manager.
As for population growth and horse-car collisions in Reno, how much of the problem can be attributed to liberal lunacy in California that’s driving people out?
Goicoechea, a large-animal vet and public-lands rancher, holds 158 active AUMs on the Newark Allotment in the Bristlecone Field Office.
His dad receives 6,681 AUMs per year on the same parcel, equivalent to 556 wild horses.
RELATED: What’s So Important about the Virginia Range?
Western Horse Watchers Association 