Hundreds Of Wild Mustangs Are Being Rounded Up To Make More Land For Animal Agriculture

EATTHINK

Jun 24

Governor Jared Polis has urged the Bureau of Land Management to delay the wild horse roundup and search for ‘more humane’ solutions after 142 died in a federal facility in Cañon City.

The capture of hundreds of mustangs roaming across western Colorado is underway despite calls from Governor Jared Polis to halt the roundups until a “more cost effective and humane” solution to manage the wild horse population is found.

On Thursday, June 16, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) began seizing wild horses in the Piceance-East Douglas Herd Management Area - the start of a roundup that could see up to 1,250 animals removed from their natural habitat.

Federal officials are using a bait trapping method whereby they lure horses into a corral with fresh water and food. Drive-trap gather operations, which use helicopters and horseback riders, will begin around 15 July.

The decision to round up the animals comes after 145 wild horses died from an equine flu outbreak while confined in a federal holding facility in Cañon City.

“Given the outbreak at the Cañon City facility, I have serious doubts that the proposed roundup in the Piceance Basin can or should go on as planned. The health and well-being of the horses should be the foundation of any proposed activity, and placing them in a confined setting susceptible to disease outbreaks does not seemingly fit that aim,” said Polis in a letter to the BLM.

“The facilities and procedures are ill-equipped to take on the hundreds of additional horses scheduled to be removed from the range.”

A report into the potentially preventable deaths revealed multiple violations of BLM’s own policies, which include vaccinating the mustangs as soon as possible based on veterinarian advice. Despite spending more than seven months in the holding pens, many of the animals were not vaccinated; this was largely due to a staffing shortage at the facility.

“This should be a wake-up call that wild horses are safest and healthiest when they are in the wild versus in confined holding facilities,” said Scott Wilson, a Denver-based board member of the American Wild Horse Campaign (AWHC).

The wild horses that died were captured by the BLM from the West Douglas area after a huge wildfire and taken to the federal holding facility on state prison grounds. They had joined the hundreds of mustangs from the Sand Wash Basin area who were rounded up last year by a helicopter.

During these roundups horses are often separated from their family groups, many foals die from exhaustion and other horses are injured and euthanized on site. Of the horses that do survive, some are put up for adoption, but the vast majority are either sent to slaughter or kept in barren holding facilities for the rest of their lives. There are currently more than 55,000 wild horses living in long-term holding sites around the country.

Initially scheduled to begin in September, the current Piceance-East Douglas roundup was moved forward after the BLM said the area was overpopulated with horses. According to them, the public land where the herd lives is only suitable for a maximum of 235 horses, not the 1,385 currently there.

However, a recent exposé by CBS4 Investigates found that one major reason for the roundups is due to private cattle and sheep ranchers holding livestock permits on the same public lands where the wild horses are designated to roam free.

When nearly 700 horses were rounded up and removed from the Sand Wash Basin in northwestern Colorado and sent to holding facilities to live the remainder of their lives in captivity, the BLM said at the time there weren’t enough resources for the horses.

But just two months later, more than 2,000 domestic sheep were grazing on that same land, according to CBS4 Investigates.

“Livestock graze 50 to 65 percent of the annual forage production… and that leaves less than half leftover for wild horses, for elk, for mule deer to have cover for sage grouse, for grasshoppers for jackrabbits,” Wildlife biologist Erik Molvar told CBS4 Investigates. “Then at the end of the day, you still have to have enough growth for that grass plant to survive till the next year, and they’re just not surviving, and the reason is, is that the Bureau of Land Management is chronically authorizing a level of livestock grazing that constitutes overgrazing there’s no question about it.”

What’s the solution?

Birth control

The Porcine Zona Pellucida (PZP) vaccine provides a safe, humane, and effective alternative to the current wild horse management approach of traumatic roundups, according to AWHC. It is a fertility-control vaccine given to female horses on the range through injection via remote darting. PZP is scientifically proven, with over three decades of use, and is recommended by the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) for use in federally protected wild horse herds. In addition to protecting the animals, the birth control method is also far more cost-effective, costing just $30, compared to the $1,600 it costs to hold each animal.

“I think that the BLM’s wild horse and burro program is a complete scam on the U.S. taxpayer,” said Molvar. “It’s a tremendous drain on the federal coffers; all to have more livestock put back on western public lands where the taxpayer is getting very little return on the damage that’s being done.”

Birth control darting. Credit: American Wild Horse Campaign

Legislative reforms

Meanwhile, Molvar is pushing for legislative reforms that would allow environmentalists to buy out grazing permits, so livestock grazing activities could decrease more significantly.

“Livestock grazing is probably the most serious ecological impact on western public lands for the vast majority of the lands,” said Molvar. “What we need is legislation that allows the voluntary buyout of grazing permits, and then their retirement permanently, so that the conservation buyers can know that what they’re buying is going to stick, and we’re going to have the ecological rebound that happens when you take off the cattle and sheep for long periods of years.”

Take action

Move to a plant-based food system: Choosing plant-based food instead of animal-based products is one of the most powerful things you can do to help protect the lands where wild horses should be roaming free. To help you get started, Species Unite has released a What We Think, Wear and Eat Matters Starter Kit. You can download your free kit here.

Speak out: Please join us in urging Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland to stop these roundups and work with the American Wild Horse Campaign to find sustainable solutions to save these treasured and legally protected animals. You can sign the petition here. Polis has also urged Coloradans to contact the BLM personally. You can find their details here.

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