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.

Next year marks its fiftieth anniversary.

Today, most wild horse areas are managed primarily for livestock.

Most of the so-called advocacy groups are trying to ruin the herds with contraceptives.

The rancher-friendly ‘Path Forward‘ will remove 70% of the horses from America’s public lands.

There will be five times as many horses in contracted pastures as on the range.

What exactly are we supposed to celebrate?

RELATED: Fiftieth Anniversary ‘Celebration’ of WHB Act?

Resource management plans determine, among other things, who gets what on America’s public lands.  They set the speed limits.

Roundups enforce those limits.  They are the highway patrol of the wild horse world.

If you exceed the limits, you don’t get a ticket, you are removed from the road.

That you can only go 20 while others can go 80 is beyond the scope of the program.

The Park Service counts the horses six times per year, in February, March, May, July, September, and November, according to a news release published in November, 2019.

Western Horse Watchers has been unable to find any data since March, 2020.

Did they stop doing it?  Probably not.

Why did they go underground?  Perhaps they don’t want you to see the long-term effects of the darting program.

What about other such programs?  There’s no accountability to the public.

Every group that administers a darting program, whether on public or private lands, should be required to produce a census count with demographics, at least once a year, so the American people can see what’s being done to their wild horses.

They already have the data.

Remember, there’s no such thing as birth control for horses, only safe and effective birth control for horses, and interfering with nature is a good alternative to roundups.

And above all, never talk about resource allocations, management priorities and privately owned livestock.

RELATED: Assateague Wild Horse Census Temporarily Halted?

Roundups, sterilization and long-term holding are effects.  They are outcomes of a process.  If you want to change the outcomes, you have to look upstream in the process.

Why are these effects occurring?

How much forage has been allocated to public-lands ranchers?  How many horses would it support?  What is the true AML?  How does the current herd size compare to that?  Would the roundup be necessary if the HMA was managed principally for wild horses?

Why is it managed primarily for livestock?  How are resource allocations determined?

Why are the horses treated like pests on land set aside for them?

RELATED: Confusion Wild Horses Get Short End of Stick.

It is an enforcement action, designed to achieve the resource allocations of the Rawlins and Lander RMPs.  It’s not about overpopulation and rangeland degradation.

You’re a fool if you think it will be called off or anything in the wild horse world will change for the better because of an election.

You don’t have time to be reading wild horse blogs.  Go vote.

These people are helping the government manage wild horse areas principally for livestock, by enforcing RMPs that are biased in favor of the public-lands ranchers.

Many of the so-called advocacy groups are involved.  Don’t give them a penny!

RELATED: Future of Wild Horses in Hands of U.S. Senate?

It’s when the poor ranchers can enjoy the full benefit of their permitted AUMs.

Consider this example from Appendix VII of the Final EA for wild horse management actions in the Caliente Complex:

To reestablish the health to the rangeland in the Areas we currently run Cattle the population of Wild Horses must be managed properly.  Current numbers indicate a gross overpopulation of Wild Horses on our allotments as well as many others.  We currently have an allotment that is supposed to allow us up to 327 Cattle (1312 AUMS) on our Sheep Flat permit.  The damage because of overpopulation of Wild Horses has made it to where we can barely run 100 head on this Allotment and not for the full grazing season.  We have to gather cattle and move them to rented pasture in Barclay to finish out the summer season.

Can you imagine that?  Having to pay market rates to feed your cattle?  You wouldn’t wish that on your worst enemy.

In a story posted yesterday by the Paulick Report, a news service devoted to the horseracing industry, Dr. Tom Lenz, WHBAB member representing veterinary medicine, said “I think the problem we have today is that the public, through Congress, is managing the horses, rather than the BLM managing them through scientists.”

OK, people, it’s time to ‘fess up.

Who among you have been writing and approving the RMPs that allocate eighty percent or more of the forage in HMAs to privately owned livestock?

How many of you have been demanding the roundups and other population controls that enforce those resource allocations?

Which one of you secured funding for the ‘Path Forward,’ which will ultimately remove seventy percent of America’s wild horses and burros from their home range and place them into off-range pastures and private sanctuaries?

Who benefits as HMAs are zeroed out, predators are decimated and invasive species, such as pinyon pines and juniper trees, are eradicated?

Who pushed for changes to the WHB Act, rendering it ineffective?

Avoid the consequences.  Identify yourselves in the comments.  Do it now!

“Nevada’s livestock industry would not exist without ranchers’ ability to graze on public land,” according to the Nevada Rangelands Resources Commission, because most of the land is owned by the federal government.

Nevada is also home to half of America’s wild horses.

Western Horse Watchers is unable to determine if NRRC is a government entity or a trade group masquerading as a government entity.  The state seal appears on their home page.  An email seeking clarification in November 2019 was never answered.

Federal ownership of land in other western states is considerably less, but we see the same pattern of roundups and biased RMPs.

Do you think the rancher-friendly ‘Path Forward‘ applies only to Nevada?

“Healthy horses on healthy rangelands” is a lie.

Roundups enforce resource allocations of RMPs, which assign eighty percent or more of the forage to privately owned livestock, not because the ranchers are on the verge of bankruptcy but because they have co-opted a federal agency to suit their agenda.

The wild horse and burro program has been turned into a grazing program ancillary.

Cut them off.  The west is settled.  They are destroying an irreplaceable natural resource.

How many tears were shed when manufacturers of vacuum tubes went out of business with the advent of the transistor?

Who cried for makers of carburetors when fuel injectors hit the market?

Can you imagine the federal government spending hundreds of millions of dollars to marginalize Henry Ford so it can protect the jobs of those who make buggy whips?

It’s time to end public-lands ranching and restore the WHB Act to its original form.

It was chartered in 1983 with an AML of 29, according to Section 4.1.2 of the Final EA for wild horse management actions therein.

To quality as an HMA, an area must supply forage, water, cover, space, and reproductive viability, according to Section 1.1.  In 2007, Moriah was evaluated for wild horse suitability and “failed to meet one or more of the five required habitat components resulting in the decision, under the land-use plan, to drop its HMA status.”

But the EA does not say which requirements were not met and does not explain the 714 wild horses currently living there.

There must be another reason.  The allotments that overlap the HA were not zeroed out so perhaps it had resources coveted by the public-lands ranchers.

The initial comments in Appendix V of the EA support that theory.

RELATED: Moriah Roundup Pending.

Everybody says PZP is the answer so let’s go with that.  Mind not required.

RELATED: Another Reader Falls for Overpopulation Narrative.

Earlier this week, BLM released a fact sheet for public lands in Oregon and Washington during FY 2019.

Key management indicators can be computed for the wild horse and burro program in Oregon, using data on page 29 of the pdf.  (There are no HMAs in Washington.)

Animals allowed by plan = 2,697 (some burros present but assumed to be 100% horses)

Authorized land = 2,698,902 acres

Current population = 5,878 (assumed to be 100% horses)

Required forage allocation = 2,697 × 12 = 32,364 AUMs per year

Current herd size  = 5,878 ÷ 2,697 = 2.2X AML

Stocking rate allowed by plan = 2,697 ÷ 2,698,902 × 1,000 = 1 horse per thousand acres

What about livestock?  Unfortunately, the data provided on page 30 don’t include the acreage designated for grazing and the average grazing season.

The number of cow/calf pairs can be estimated if you guess the grazing season but the stocking rate can’t be determined.

Authorized forage = 659,201 + 69,141 = 728,342 AUMs per year

Grazing season = 6 months (assumed)

Authorized herd size = 728,342 ÷ 6 = 121,390 cow/calf pairs

Stocking rate allowed by plan = ?

Livestock receive 22 times more forage than horses.  But a more detailed comparison of management practices in Oregon is not possible, thanks to the missing numbers.

“The answer is … PZP for humane fertility control,” according to the writer of a letter to the Las Vegas Review-Journal.

That’s right.  Minimize the horses so their land can be managed primarily for livestock.

You go, girl.

RELATED: Future of Wild Horses in Hands of U.S. Senate?

We know that cattle and sheep are intelligent, hard working and dedicated to the improvement of western rangelands, so they should be recognized for their efforts.

Unlike wild horses and burros, who are destroying their habitat.

What’s the difference?  Human involvement.

Are local advocacy groups allowed to participate?

No!  You only need to look at the Sinbad roundup to see what happens when volunteers try to help wild horses and burros.

Every year, 50% of grazing receipts or $10 million, whichever is greater, goes back into the program for rangeland improvements.  Wells, tanks and water lines, road, fence and gate repairs, etc.  Other funds go to predator management and vegetation control.

In exchange, the ranchers pay the government almost nothing.

What’s invested in the WHB program?

The news release sounds like a mutual admiration society.  The president of the Public Lands Council, a cheerleader group for the public-lands ranchers, said “Grazing on federal lands is a critical part of our country’s food supply…,” which it isn’t.

You could end the program tomorrow and nobody would notice.

Only a few seconds earlier she had been digging it into his gums, spurring him on to victory.  Then the bit broke—allowing him to give her some feedback on her riding style.

He bolted from the arena, with her on top, down the driveway and over to a busy highway, according to a story posted this morning by the Nashville Tennessean.

He ran wild for 15 minutes but does not appear to be a wild horse.  The incident stopped with the help of a firefighter and nobody was hurt.

But what will happen to the horse?