killer job out there
an arguably baseless Bureau of Land Management program runs itself and wild horses in deadly circles.
“Oh my god.” The voice on the audio is shaky. It’s coming from an observer who’s filming an equally shaky video taken from a far-away public observation site during the first BLM-conducted wild horse roundup of 2024. After focusing on the subject in the distance, it’s apparent a foal has been roped by a wrangler on horseback. The audio catches two noises in addition to muffled emotion from the observer. Wind sweeping across the vast public acreage, and the uproar of a predating helicopter.
The Bureau of Land Management has wasted no time in beginning its 2024 season of wild horse helicopter roundups with the East Pershing Complex roundup in Nevada, aiming to capture and remove twice as many mustangs collectively from western public lands as the previous year, under its persistent narrative that wild horses are overpopulated, in peril due to drought and lack of forage, and the primary cause of destruction to landscape health in areas also inhabited by sage grouse.
In direct contradiction to these claims, the BLM’s own reports from 1997 to 2019 conclude livestock as the primary majority cause (72%) of failing landscape health overall across western public lands. The same data — analyzed by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) cites wild horses as the cause of a mere 1%. Additional analysis flags concern for delinquent environmental assessments of millions of grazing-allotted rangeland and livestock grazing allotments that have been renewed despite the clear and present danger to landscape health in the environmental assessments that have been conducted.
While the agency continues the wild horse population control method of roundups by helicopter, the systematic removal of wild horses is unsustainable fiscally and practically, with tens of thousands of wild horses living out their natural lives in unnatural holding pens. Other management tools exist for implementation and standardization. PZP, a fertility control vaccine administered via remote darting, is proven effective, economical, and humane.
The foal at the roundup in Nevada isn’t just struggling.
It’s writhing.
Wrenching its tiny body in every way possible to evade the noose around its young neck. The baby wild horse, separated from its mother and family, slams itself into the uneven terrain, and when it finally manages to stand, it moves with a new struggle — a limp that will, within minutes, result in the swift end of its life.
The wranglers haphazardly load the baby onto an ATV, and against the biting metal contrasting the early morning hours just prior spent nestled between its family band, the wranglers end its life.
“Gathers like this are conducted to ensure the health of public lands, as well as the health of the wild horses in and around the Complex. Herd overpopulation and severe drought conditions have cumulative impacts on public lands, including wild horse health that must be mitigated,” said Chris Mitchell, Humboldt River Field Office Manager in a press statement prior to the beginning of the roundup.
“As always, we are committed to conducting safe and humane gather operations as we work to protect animal health by bringing herd size down to AML to restore a thriving natural ecological balance to public lands, and from further deterioration associated with overpopulation,” Mitchell ensured.
There’s been no sight of concerning wild horse health at East Pershing. BLM has determined the initially captured wild horses to be “thin”, but not “very thin”, terms developed in the early 1980s by a veterinary doctor when referring to the weight of domestic horses.
Dead horses but livestock
As of 2021, the land included in the East Pershing Complex is home to nearly 30,000 head of cattle and sheep permitted by BLM to graze public lands via the tax-subsidized public lands grazing program.
An interactive map published by the Western Watersheds Project shows active grazing allotments covering the vast majority of acreage coinciding with the seven total Herd Management Areas (HMAs) and Herd Areas (HAs): Augusta Mountains, North Stillwater, and the Tobin Range. The Herd Areas include Augusta Mountains, East Range, Humboldt, and the Sonoma Range.
In a 2017 Environmental Assessment (EA) prepared by the BLM Humboldt County Field Office that decided the fate of the East Pershing Complex wild horses, a section on historical effects of livestock grazing explicitly summaries that by the 1930s, livestock grazing was the major cause of impact to soil and vegetation.
The EA states that for the area being evaluated, ranching “had significant impact” on eliminating native plants, introducing cheatgrass, and degrading wetlands and riparian areas which led to the destabilization of water sources and the meadows they naturally fed.
The field office also wrote in the EA that since the passing of the Public Rangelands Improvement Act (PRIA) in 1978, changes in livestock grazing have been made to minimize the impact on rangeland health. These stated changes include reducing livestock numbers and implementing seasonal grazing management practices.
“Current livestock grazing management has helped reduce the impacts livestock have on soil and has maintained soil resource conditions,” the Humboldt County Field Office stated.
Wild horses are mentioned in historical context as roaming by the thousands in the same areas, though never cited directly as the cause of destruction.
In Nevada, 63% of assessed BLM allotments were failing health standards specifically due to livestock. “Other” reasons for failing landscape health standards, which groups in wild horses with other causes, accounted for 15%. (Note: Failing landscape health due to wild horses is higher in Nevada compared to the rest of the western states, because there are more wild horses designated to live in Nevada than in any other state.)
There are 18 million acres of grazing-permitted public land in Nevada that have not yet been assessed. That totals to more than 18 million acres, including a swath of land within the East Pershing Complex.
The issue is evident at the Nevada district level as well. After a 2019 wildfire burned acreage that affected landscape health across more than 6,000 acres within public land grazing allotments managed by the BLM Humboldt Field Office in Winnemucca District, the neighboring BLM Mount Lewis Field Office was tasked via an existing disaster response statute to analyze the burned landscape and making a recommendation to rehabilitate the acreage. The Mount Lewis District office declared damage to Sage Grouse, Pronghorn, Mule Deer, and Wild horse habitat, and recommended closing the grazing allotments for at least two seasons to reseed and rest the soil.
“The Buffalo Fire has increased the potential of wind and water erosion, and the spread of noxious weeds and invasive/non-native plant species. If left untreated, damage to these important resources could reduce ecological conditions and rangeland health. To promote the success of vegetative treatments and promote natural recovery, rest from livestock is recommended,” wrote Mount Lewis Field Manager, Jon Sherve, in the November 2019 letter to the public.
Despite the recommendation, the district office in Winnemucca elected not to close the portions of grazing allotments managed by the Humboldt District office.
The East Pershing Complex roundup continues.
The agency aims to remove nearly 3,000 of the 3,375 roaming the complex. Humane fertility control will not be implemented, though the wild horses in these herds are reported to be tractable and are viable candidates for the economical solution that’s been proven for more than three decades to be effective in managing herd populations over time.
To date, 11 wild horses have been put to death. BLM reports to have euthanized several fully-grown, mature horses for blindness in one eye. Interesting that wild horses ranging in age from seven to 10+ years of age can thrive in their natural habitats with the use of only one eye, and die within hours of capture by helicopter and big-money contracts.
According to the BLM roundup tracking site, the baby horse was “euthanized” the same day due to a dislocated knee — an “acute” injury directly resulting from the roundup.
The word euthanasia means “good death” in Latin. But how is it possible to consider a “good death” as being stampeded from one’s home, separated from one’s family, roped by the neck, thrown to the ground until bones snap, and then killed at the hands of one’s attackers?
And how is it possible we’re still funding a government program that diminishes the obvious culprit while needlessly running our tax dollars and wild horses into the ground?
Sources:
Mount Lewis Field Office Letter to Public
Western Watersheds Project Lawsuit Document
PEER analysis of BLM grazing allotments
Final EA BLM Stillwater Field Office
Humboldt County Gov Livestock Grazing Recommendation