The BLM’s Wild Horse and Burro program is at a crossroads, according to an article posted today by the American Veterinary Medical Association.  The author claims that HMAs are overpopulated by 100 percent to 1,500 percent.

“There were 81,951 animals on 26.9 [million] acres of public rangelands and 44,730 animals in corrals or pastures as of mid-2018…

To give some perspective, the BLM says ideally 27,000 of these animals can live in balance with livestock and wildlife on public lands.”

This is another example of misuse of figures.  The aimed-at population of 27,000 animals and available land of 26.9 million acres pertain to HMAs only.  The observed population of 81,951 animals corresponds to all lands, including HMAs.  You can’t compare 81,951 to 27,000 and conclude wild horses and burros are overpopulated because they don’t have the same land-basis.

Note that the combined AML of 27,000 animals (horses and burros) and available land of 26.9 million acres yield a population density of one animal per thousand acres, just one twelfth (8.3%) of the density typically allowed for livestock.

There are real problems and stated problems.  The stated problem is that wild horses are overpopulated on western rangelands.  The real problem is that they compete with livestock for forage, depriving public-lands ranchers and their overlords of benefits owed to them in exchange for their campaign contributions and political support.

What you see on the range is not private-sector capitalism.  The helicopters, the bait traps, the zeroing-out of HMAs and reductions of AMLs, the video propaganda and bogus news reports, all are the result of a special interest using the media and instrumentalities of government to achieve its agenda.  It needs to be broken up.

If you’re a numbers guy, this article in NorCal Fishing News, dated 08/26/18, will make you smile.  (Not sure how it got into a fishing report, might be a reprint of figures published elsewhere.)

The video below shows some vegetation on the side of a road in the Virginia Range near sunset on 08/24/18.

You might think somebody took a sickle to that brush but the work was done by wild horses.  Remaining stalks are about six inches tall, no trimmings to clean up.  It’s nature’s fire control regimen.

See also this story in Markets Insider dated 08/23/18.

The article also stated that the BLM typically allows eight cow/calf pairs per square mile, equivalent to eight wild horses per square mile.  That yields a stocking rate for livestock of 12.5 animals per thousand acres, compared to an aimed-at population density of one animal per thousand acres for horses on BLM lands.

Who benefits from this arrangement?  Is this what Congress intended on lands set aside for wild horses and burros or is it a twisting and stretching of ‘multiple use’ by the BLM, on behalf of the livestock industry?  Is this the meaning of ‘thriving ecological balance?’

The figures at the end of the article hint at the idea of replacing AMLs with pie charts that show how resources are allocated among consumers on HMAs.

Roscoe’s Oriental Rug Emporium.

A news release issued yesterday by Protect the Harvest blamed an unnamed ‘extremist’ group for persuading the folks at Colorado State University to withdraw from sterilization research on wild mares, calling the decision ‘disappointing.’

And rightfully so, because cutting ovaries out of wild horses is as mainstream as cutting unborn kids out of pregnant women.  Everybody does it.

Although many wild horse advocates filled out the computer-generated letter and sent it in, the driving force in the university changing its mind may have been just a few right-minded and highly influential people.

Can you spell e-n-d-o-w-m-e-n-t?

The folks at PTH, like the Clinton supporters on election night, can’t understand why some people—most people—don’t agree with the idea of ovariectomy via colpotomy.

Could it be the flow of mutilated ponies to the demonic futurity might be reduced?

Or is much more at stake?

Look at the list of the organizations in favor of sterilization.  Many are aligned with the livestock industry, cheerleaders for ranchers who fatten their cattle on public lands at fire-sale prices.

Gotta keep the gravy train rolling, reward the donors and political supporters, let more cattlemen suck on the sugar teat.  That means WHB populations must be reduced to AML, immediately, by sterilization or euthanasia.  Slaughter is another option.

A better approach would be to raise the grazing fee on public lands to $25 per AUM and require labels on beef that show where it was produced.  Educate the public on threats to our wild ones by public-lands ranchers and their allies at the BLM.  Admit the carrying capacity of the land is higher than publicly acknowledged and allow the horses to return to Herd Areas and beyond.

Put more land in private hands, waive property taxes on acreage purchased for sanctuaries and rescues, omit sales taxes on equipment and supplies procured therefor.

RELATED: CSU Withdraws from Wild Horse Sterilization Research.

Herb Alpert, A Taste of Honey.

Mary Chapin Carpenter, Down At The Twist And Shout.

Colorado State University announced yesterday that it would not participate in surgical sterilization experiments on wild horses sponsored by the BLM.  Refer to the report dated 08/09/18 from the Animal Welfare Institute.

RELATED: CSU Joins Search for Wild Horse ‘Final Solution’.

Check out the photo in this article of mountain biker Jeremy Hottinger going airborne at Wild Horse Monument near Vantage, WA.  The image was captured by freelance photographer Ben Herndon.  The venue is an unfinished sculpture on top of a ridge featuring wild mustangs.

The sculpture appears in the following video.

RELATED: Grandfather Cuts Loose the Ponies.

No, it doesn’t.  It benefits the government serfs who fatten their cattle on public lands at fire-sale prices.  Fewer horses on the range means more forage for livestock.  Keep the gravy train going, more cattlemen sucking the sugar teat.

The text posted with the video is propaganda, typical for the kooks at Protect the Harvest, who said earlier this year the Virginia Range had been decimated by wild horses.  (Go to the Index, scroll down to Virginia Range and look at the photos.)

Yep, female genital mutilation is good.  Nice job PTH.  Allahu Akbar.

Note the collaboration of BLM, Zoetis and Priefert on the project.

Researchers at Colorado State University will help the BLM perfect a rarely used sterilization procedure, known as ovariectomy via colpotomy, for removing a mare’s ovaries, according to a report dated 08/03/18 in the Coloradoan.  If approved, the study will begin in October.

Public acceptance of fertility control was a first step.  Now the focus is fertility prevention.

Who benefits?  Why would the BLM engage in such barbaric practices?

It’s not about reducing costs of the WHB program.  There are no plans to close departments, sell buildings and lay people off if the research is ‘successful.’

The move is a payoff to the livestock industry, with whom the BLM has been aligned for decades.  Ranchers look at the horses and burros as pests, consuming forage that belongs to them—on lands sent aside for the horses and burros.  The WHB Act, amended several times in their favor, has been a pain in their backside since 1971.

Eighty percent of Americans want these animals protected and preserved.  But it doesn’t matter, because the BLM doesn’t answer to the voters.

Two hundred mares, gathered from the range, will be placed in the program.  Of the 100 mares to be spayed, 30 will be returned to the range and 70 will go to adoption, some of whom may appear in the demonic Wild Spayed Filly Futurity.

Religion and politics, oh my!  H/T Michael Voris and the folks at Church Militant.

See also this post by Ann Barnhardt, dated 07/29/18.

See the report posted today at Intermountain Farm & Ranch about the Red Desert gather, which may begin next week.  The story addresses concerns about captured horses going to slaughter.

“Interested buyers are required to sign paperwork.”

No problems there.  Barack Obama took an oath to uphold the Constitution (and his administration was lawless).

The article also indicates that Wyoming is home to more than 7,000 wild horses, but the Appropriate Management Level is 3,725 horses.  Another case of misuse of figures.

The BLM spokesperson quoted in the article said research projects are underway that will help find more effective facility [sic] control methods, probably meaning fertility control methods, which is a code word for fertility prevention methods.

The report did not mention if AUM curtailment would be considered as a means of preventing overgrazing or if the grazing fee on public rangelands would be raised from $1.41 per AUM to $25 per AUM, in line with the costs of private ranching.

The government serfs are riding a gravy train and they know it.  And who pays?  Our wild horses and burros.

RELATED: Red Desert Gather Announced.

History Repeating by the Propellerheads.

BLM announced yesterday that it had issued a Special Recreation Permit to Black Rock City LLC for Burning Man, to be held on public lands near Gerlach, NV.  The festival will run from 08/26/18 through 09/03/18.

The permit allows up to 70,000 participants on approximately 4400 acres, for a population density of 15,909 humans per thousand acres.

As for the wild horses and burros that surround the place, they’ll probably just keep their heads down and avoid the chaos, trying to carry on their legacy at an average density of one animal per thousand acres.

RELATED: Vendor Advisory for 2018 Burning Man.

Chris Stewart (R-UT) sponsored a roundtable yesterday in Salt Lake City to discuss WHB management in his state.  He’s no friend of the horses.  There are too many of them and they go outside their herd management areas, according to a report posted 08/01/18 by KMYU-TV.

The estimated WHB population in Utah is 5,000 animals, with an AML of 2,500 (stats cited in the story, numbers from the BLM put the AML at 1,911).

This is another example of misuse of figures.  You can’t compare 5,000 to 2,500 because they don’t have the same land-basis.

The ranching industry appeared to be under-represented at the conference, judging by the list of guests, but maybe that was by design.  Perhaps the event was held to give the impression he’s interested in the advocacy viewpoint?  You know, they always kiss you before they screw you.

Chris Stewart is no conservative paragon.  Almost certainly he’s in the back pocket of the beef lobby.  He received a Liberty Score® of ‘D’ (67%) at Conservative Review.

“It is a dangerous procedure.  They’re doing it sort of the cheapest way.  Therefore, there’s a potential for basically fatal complications.”

Agree.  See the report posted today by Oregon Public Broadcasting.  Both sides of the debate are presented.  The story did not indicate if a reduction in livestock AUMs was under consideration to alleviate damage attributable to overgrazing.

RELATED: Sterilization Research Proposed for Wild Horses.

Two opinion pieces in the East Oregonian:

• Original: Don’t Permanently Sterilize Wild Horses, 07-20-18
• Response: Sterilizations Won’t Make Dent in Wild Horse Population, 07-31-18

How many elements of the wild horse narrative can you find in the response?

AMLs tell you how many animals can inhabit a parcel of land.  They don’t tell you anything about the available resources and how they’re allocated across that land.

The total AML of 26,690, cited in the response, corresponds to HMAs covering 26.7 million acres, for an average population density of one animal per thousand acres on lands managed by the BLM.  (The population density of the Virginia Range, not managed by the BLM, is ten animals per thousand acres.)

The estimated population of 81,951 animals probably corresponds to HMAs and lands outside HMAs, wherever WHB are found, for an unknown number of acres.  You can’t compare 81,951 to 26,690 because the figures don’t have the same land-basis.

Instead of looking at AMLs, we should be looking at pie charts that show how the available resources are allocated among the various consumers (horses, burros, cattle, sheep, antelope, deer, etc).  A chart may indicate that, although the wild horse population of a given area is three times larger than AML, the horses only account for half the available resources.  The situation isn’t as serious as originally portrayed.

UPDATE: Added graphic.

RELATED: Sterilization Research Proposed for Wild Horses.

Here’s a presentation about wild horses for a professional communications course at Colorado State University.  Purpose of this post is not to criticize the speaker but to question the content of the speech.  Maybe the student did what he had to do to get a passing grade from his Marxist professor.

Where did he get his information?  From the ranching industry?  Presentation seems to be very one-sided.  Includes the infamous photos from the Cold Creek herd in 2015 and contains several elements of the wild horse narrative.

• Habitat damage
• Competition for scarce resources with other native species
• No natural predators
• Overpopulation

The talk even mentions climate change, a sure sign the speech was produced by liberals for consumption by liberals.  The discussion beginning at 3:01 blames wild horses for damaging riparian habitats, when it was the fence that caused it, by interfering with the free-roaming nature of these animals and their search for food and water.

Posting this video as a guest commentary.  More people are learning about these icons of the American West, and that’s a good thing.  Additional remarks:

• BLM allows oil and gas exploration and production on public lands, along with timber harvesting and mining, but the greatest threat to WHB comes from the ranching industry
• The conflict goes back many years
• Horses and burros removed from public lands are also placed in off-range pastures
• BLM spends about $50 million annually to care for animals removed from western rangelands
• BLM tries to place these animals into private hands through adoption and sale
• PZP is a contraceptive, extended use may lead to sterilization
• BLM is moving ahead with sterilization research as a potential long-term ‘solution’ to the wild horse ‘problem’

H/T to Laura, a new voice for our wild ones at Gone to the Horses.

Refer to this opinion piece posted 07/25/18 in the Elko Daily Free Press about new rules for selling wild horses.

These letters often give the serious reader an opportunity to ferret out elements of the wild horse narrative, like one of those word puzzles.  Not so in this case.  There’s only one, namely, that horses are non-native species.

The government serfs, who fatten their cattle on public lands at fire-sale prices, are delighted that individuals can now purchase up to 25 animals at one time.  It was smart move by the BLM.  The waiting list is long and people have been hanging on the fence for years to just to adopt one or two horses.  There are many WHB enthusiasts that have large ranches and deep pockets, and can easily care for 25, 50, 75 or more horses.

These cattlemen are an entitled bunch.  They see these changes as a step toward ranching utopia, where wild horses and burros have been removed from public rangelands, no longer consuming forage that belongs to them.

In other parts of the country, hard-working farmers and ranchers use their own land to put food on our tables.  We need more of that.

Raise the grazing fee on public rangelands to $25 per AUM.  Or $50 or $75 or more.