6/25/21

Interior, BLM struggle to manage feral horses and burros

Feral horses range freely on a Kewa Nation pasture

The modern horse was introduced to North America by the Spanish late in the 15th Century and then by other European colonizers. Acquiring the horse in the 1740s enabled the Lakota to win the Black Hills. 

Today, tribal officials say there are an estimated 75,000 feral horses roaming the Navajo Nation, "ravaging the range and depleting water sources." Because they have no natural predators feral horse herds double in size every four to five years. “You don’t have wild horses anymore. You have their bodies, but they are … domesticated,” said one researcher.

After the Bureau of Land Management held livestock production scoping sessions in 2020 the Trump Organization ended some protections for endangered species and public lands because ranchers insist grazing cattle reduces wildfire risks despite copious evidence and strong arguments to the contrary. The National Cattlemen’s Beef Association and American Farm Bureau Federation are pushing for the capture and slaughter of some 130,000 feral horses over 10 years at an estimated cost of $1 billion. 

The Trump Organization proposed slashing $10 million and 29 positions from the Interior Department’s feral horse and burro program. Funding for birth control was cut and the Bureau of Land Management was allowed to sell horses protected under a 1971 law to be harvested and the meat sold mostly abroad. The United States already sends more than 12,000 horses annually across the southern border for slaughter ultimately bound for markets in Europe and Asia.

Today feral horses and burros on public lands number nearly 100,000 or about four times what the landscape can sustain without damaging habitat. In Montana, Wyoming, New Mexico and seven other states the BLM adopts out, seeks private pastures for, and feeds the horses. The cost of keeping feral horses in holding pens off wild lands costs taxpayers at least $49 million annually. Wyoming has the second-highest feral horse population in the country with at least 7,144 of these horses. The BLM’s target is 3,725. 

In an era when western states are scrambling to preserve habitat for bison, wapiti, bighorn sheep, pronghorns, deer, the threatened Greater sage grouse and all the other wildlife at risk to the Republican Party how is running nurseries for introduced species like wild horses and burros either conservative or sustainable? 

Ironic that in a country that exports more weapons of mass destruction than all others combined and relentlessly hunts nearly anything that moves, in parts of the Mountain West and even in bright red Wyoming Equus ferus is still seen as a pet.
Park County commissioners and wild horse advocates sparred over the words and messaging delivered in the draft Natural Resources Management Plan during a meeting last week. Drawing the most ire from the wild horse advocates was a perceived negative description of the herd occupying the McCullough Peaks area, referred to as “feral” in the draft. “They have been mistakenly labeled non-native or feral,” a letter written by wild horse advocacy group Friends of a Legacy to the commissioners said. Commissioner Lee Livingston said although he previously used the horses himself, he said the quality of the McCullough herd has drastically declined in recent times. Livingston said the wild horses are no more than descendants from runaway ranch horses. [Cody Enterprise, Horses ‘native or feral?’ Sides debate proposed plan]
Tracy Stone-Manning is President Joe Biden's choice to lead the BLM and if confirmed she will serve under Interior Secretary Deb Haaland. Stone-Manning has called nearly every Trump era ruling "illegal" including its plans to manage feral horses and burros. 

Clear the second growth conifers and eastern red cedar then restore aspen habitat, prescribe burns, begin extensive Pleistocene rewilding using bison and cervids, empower tribes, lease private land for wildlife corridors, turn feral horses from BLM pastures onto other public land to control exotic grasses and buy out the welfare ranchers Tony Dean warned us about.
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1 comment:

  1. larry kurtzSeptember 6, 2021 at 10:08 AM

    “I'm getting very high percentage - in the 90s - of Spanish blood," she said. "Many of them are descendants of the Spanish horses that came through with the Conquistadores." Taos News

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Republican is simply another word for Earth hater but comments intended to troll the author or other readers will not be published so use a handle or even your real name and don’t be an asshole.