There is hope, according to the writers of a guest column published yesterday in Horse Nation, not because the BLM has decided to change the resource allocations and management priorities on lands set aside for wild horses, but because Congress may force it to implement an $11 million darting campaign.

Do they not see that they’ve thrown in with the groups they criticize?  Do they really want HMAs managed primarily for livestock?  How many wild horse herds are truly overpopulated?

The Confusion HMA, subject of next week’s roundup, certainly isn’t.  Would they start the darting program there?  Before or after the roundup?

Next to the government and public-lands ranchers, the greatest threat to America’s wild horses is not the oil companies, not the mining companies, but many of the so-called advocacy groups.

RELATED: Why Should You Oppose Sterilization of Wild Mares?

The link pointed to a copy of the story in the Houston Chronicle.

The government spends $57 million per year to warehouse 52,000 wild horses and burros, according to a recent news release, so it can collect an estimated $850,000 in grazing fees from the ranchers to whom their food is sold.

Revenue = 52,000 horses × 12 AUMs per horse per year × $1.35 per AUM

With taxpayers making up the difference, the grazing program is a fine example of redistribution of wealth.  That’s what Protect the Harvest is trying to protect.

RELATED: Wild Horse Wars?, Grazing Program Ancillaries.

For the same reason you oppose roundups, fertility control, sex ratio skewing and castration: They’re all part of plan to manage wild horse areas primarily for livestock.

That is the goal of the ‘Path Forward‘ and those who signed it.

Everything is off the table until those areas are managed principally for wild horses, per the original statute.

In yesterday’s news release about the WHB Program in FY 2020, BLM said it protects wild horses and burros by gathering and removing excess animals from the range and offering them for adoption or purchase at facilities and events around the country.

Except that’s not what Velma had in mind.  They were to be protected on their home range.

Horse #81 is excess in an area where the AML is 80.  Same for horse #240.  The forage assigned livestock can support 450 of them, for a true AML of 530, so a roundup is not necessary.

If Congress wants to write letters to the Secretary of the Interior about the treatment of wild horses and burros, why not condemn public-lands ranching?

The Animal Welfare Institute said in a news release yesterday that 58 lawmakers from both houses of Congress sent a letter to the Department of the Interior condemning the BLM’s plan to sterilize wild mares from the Confusion HMA in western Utah.

Instead, they suggested, wild horse populations should be controlled with PZP.

Nobody wants to talk about causes.

The HMA is managed primarily for livestock.

Look at the resource allocations and management priorities of the RMP.

Then you’ll understand why the AML is low and the desire to shrink the herd is high.

RELATED: Confusion DR Setting New Precedent in WH Management?

Wild Horse Education reported earlier this week that the Forest Service has issued a decision notice authorizing a reduction of the AML for the Big Summit WHT, among other things, subject to a 45-day appeal period.

The number of horses allowed by plan would change from 55–65 to 12–57, necessitating a revision to the RMP.  The limiting factor is winter forage.  See “Purpose and Need for Action” in the EA, page 11 in the pdf.

The AML is the number of horses (or burros) an area can support after diverting most of the resources to privately owned livestock.

The horses will require 684 AUMs per year at the upper end of the new AML, while domestic sheep receive approximately 1,700 AUMs per year during a summer grazing season.  The forage assigned to livestock would help the horses bulk up in the summer and be less vulnerable to winter conditions.

The low end of the AML is usually set at approximately 50% of the high end, to provide five years between roundups at a growth rate of fifteen to twenty percent per year.

But the project sets the low end at roughly 20% of the high end, allowing the herd size to be cut to the bone.  This would set new precedent in wild horse management.

If the herd survives from a starting point of 12, how many years would pass before the population reaches 57?  The growth rate at Big Summit is thought to be around 8% per year, according to “Current Conditions” in the EA (page 10 in the pdf).

Here is the mathematical relationship.  Solve for x.

12 × 1.08^x = 57

The answer is 20.24—twenty years to reach the high end of AML.  Throw in some contraceptives and the herd will basically flat-line, the dream of land managers and ranchers everywhere.

RELATED: Comments Invited on Changes to Big Summit Management Plan.

It’s wild horses against the public-lands ranchers and Protect the Harvest against the wild horse advocates in this lengthy article by The Washington Post.

The more you tilt the scales in favor of the ranchers, the larger the horse ‘problem’ becomes, along with the need for drastic actions.