Author: Western Horse Watchers

Governor Praised for Resuming Fertility Control Program

Nevada legislators commended the governor for reinstating ‘humane management practices’ on the Virginia Range, according to a story posted yesterday by Nevada Appeal of Carson City.

The wild horse preservation movement began in these hills, east of Reno, with the efforts of Velma Johnston in the 1950s.

Today, you have many advocacy groups, some big, some small, arguing there are too many horses on the range.  Their habitat is threatened by development.  Therefore, we have to destroy them to save them.  Roundups are cruel, darting is not.  Never mind the side effects.

Fertility_Control_Puzzle_Solved-1

The Virginia Range, with a population density exceeding ten horses per thousand acres, defies the narrative pushed by the public-lands ranchers and their allies in government, namely, that western rangelands can only support one horse per thousand acres.

It’s an outlier that needs to be brought in line with the HMAs and WHTs (federal lands).

And who’s gonna make that happen?  The PZP zealots.

RELATED: NDA Allows PZP Zealots Back On Virginia Range.

Enjoy Them from a Distance

A BLM news release issued yesterday reminds horse watchers to keep a safe distance when viewing or filming them on the range.  One hundred yards is the minimum recommended distance.  (Individuals equipped with PZP dart guns who are aiding in the extermination of these animals will need to get within 25 to 40 yards for accurate shot placement.)

The announcement also suggested that you move back if they approach, which is how you tell them you’re lower in the pecking order.  Next to hand-feeding, it’s one of the best ways to make a horse pushy and disrespectful.

RELATED: Keeping a Safe Distance.

Financial Incentive Will Reduce Wild Horse Population?

This story, presented yesterday by KOLR News of Springfield MO, features Fred Woehl, chair of BLM’s Wild Horse and Burro Advisory Board.  You might get the impression from his remarks that livestock are a minority on western rangelands.

Let’s take a look at the numbers.  What matters is resource loading.

BLM currently allocates about nine million AUMs annually to privately owned cattle and sheep on public lands in the western U.S.

If the grazing season lasts three months per year, as stated by Woehl, there must be three million cow/calf pairs on western rangelands.  If the season lasts six months per year, there must be 1.5 million cow/calf pairs on those lands.

Compared to 80,000 wild horses and burros (90,000—the figure he uses—may be a bit high).

Livestock have access to 155 million acres of BLM land, wild horses and burros have 27 million acres.

That puts the population density for livestock between ten and twenty cow/calf pairs per thousand acres, compared to three animals per thousand acres for wild horses and burros.

Now which species is overpopulated?

An AUM is the amount of forage consumed in a month by one horse, one cow/calf pair or five sheep.  Wild horses and burros consume one million AUMs annually (because they’re on the range 12 months per year, as stated by Woehl).

RELATED: Will the Cash Incentive Boost WHB Adoptions?

This is Not What Americans Mean by ‘Wild Horse Protection’

Video from the Onaqui Rally on 04/05/19.  Note the poster at 0:19 and the remarks beginning at 0:50.  These so-called advocates have bought into the overpopulation narrative and now seek to “manage horses to a lower population.”

They’re not friends of the Onaqui horses, they are enemies.  They do the bidding of the public-lands ranchers.  Don’t give them a penny.

Wild Horses and Burros Facing a Bleak Future?

So say the writers of a guest column published last week by Deseret News of Salt Lake City.  The original piece was commissioned by the Property and Environment Research Center of Bozeman, MT.

There are too many wild horses and burros struggling to scrape out an existence on limited rangeland, according to the writers, the premise of the article.  (‘Axiomatic basis’ might be a better term—as if the idea was already established, accepted as true, self-evident.)

That these animals have lost over 40% of the public lands originally set aside for them seems to have been overlooked by the writers.  That they are being forced off the remaining land to accommodate privately owned livestock was not mentioned.

The words ‘cattle’ and ‘sheep’ appear nowhere in the article, as though it’s possible to discuss the ‘problem’ of wild horses and burros independently of public-lands ranching.

Consider these points made by the authors:

1. The new $1,000 incentive will benefit wild horses and burros.  It may stimulate adoptions, at least in the short term, but how many of these animals will end up at auctions because the owner’s motivation was a cash reward (extrinsic), not a concern for the horses (intrinsic).

2. Wild horses and burros have no natural predators.  Yeah, they’re the same predators that take down privately owned cattle and sheep.

Cattle Grazing on Hill-1

3. Wild horse and burro populations are three times higher than their Appropriate Management Level.  So what?  AMLs have nothing to do with the carrying capacity of the land.  Rather, they represent the forage loss the ranchers are willing to tolerate.  How can you say there are too many horses and burros on public lands when they are far outnumbered by cattle and sheep?

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4. Wild horses and burros have consumed so much forage on public lands that they’re literally on the brink of starvation.  These are free-roaming animals, they do not stand around on dry lots and starve to death.  Why can’t they move to greener pastures?  Because of fences installed by the ranchers?

5. The government spends $50 million annually to care for horses and burros in long-term holding.  Yep, the BLM spends two dollars per day to feed a horse on private land so it can collect 4.5 cents per day from the public-lands rancher to whom the forage is sold.  If it was really about the money, the government would leave the horses on the range and tell the ranchers to go pound sand.

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6. Finding ‘good homes’ for wild horses and burros is clearly a better outcome than starving on the range.  The best home for these animals is the territory set aside for them by the WHB Act of 1971.  True, there are some areas where livestock grazing is not allowed but they are the exception not the rule (three for horses and one for burros).  What’s so good about being locked in a stall and having a big pain bit shoved in your mouth?

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Folks, there is no wild horse problem, only greed and deceit on the part of the ranchers, their overlords, cheerleaders and political allies.  If they achieve their goals, this is what the charts will look like:

Wild Horse Overpopulation Planned-1

The nine million AUMs per year currently allocated to privately owned cattle and sheep on public lands in the western U.S. would support 750,000 wild horses and burros, enough to empty all of the off-range corrals and long-term pastures fifteen times over.

RELATED: Wild Horse Overpopulation?, Economics of Wild Horse Gathers.

Onaqui Mountain Protesters Gather in Salt Lake City

These people get it.  They unfurled a banner today at the BLM office showing privately owned sheep on public lands set aside for the Onaqui Mountain horses.  The caption said over 2,000 of them were allowed to graze on the HMA.  That’s enough forage to sustain 200 wild horses.

Refer to this story, posted today by Deseret News of Salt Lake City.

Also appearing were the PZP zealots, arguing that the horses would be better off if the BLM let them shoot the mares in the ass with contraceptives.  One of them admitted to the local FOX affiliate that their goal was to “lower their numbers.”

What a bunch of idiots.  They side with the ranchers!

RELATED: BLM Puts Crosshairs On Onaqui Mountain Horses.