Posts Tagged ‘Bureau of Land Management’

BLM Releases Environmental Assessment of Three Area Wild Horse Water Bail Trapping Roundup

Posted: May 17, 2013 by R.T. Fitch in Horse News, Horse Slaughter, Wild Horses/Mustangs
Tags: , , , , ,
25

Source: Elko Daily Free Press  (Unedited) – less byline

1.8 Million Acres and an alleged 1,500 horses are too many?
(120,000 acres per horse)
BLM already attacked the Antelope herd 2011~ photo by Terry Fitch

BLM already attacked the Antelope herd 2011~ photo by Terry Fitch

ELKO — The Bureau of Land Management is planning a wild horse roundup in the Antelope Valley using water bail traps.

The project area for this gather and removal of wild horses is from within and outside the Triple B, Maverick-Medicine, and the western and central portions of the Antelope Valley herd management areas. The gather is expected to begin after June 13, though specific dates have not been determined due to budget constraints and other higher priority gathers.

Total acreage within the project area is more than 1.8 million and the 2013 estimated population is 1,504 horses. The appropriate management level for the area is between 548 and 1,115 horses. With the lack of needed precipitation this past fall and winter, BLM expects there will be a lack of available water for the wild horses in the summer and fall months ahead.

This action is based on limited water and forage availability to adequately support the current population of wild horses and the result to range resources caused by a concentration on site specific areas.

Scoping began June 14, 2012. On Sept. 4, 2012, the BLM released a preliminary environmental assessment analyzing the impacts of this proposed horse gather to the human environment for a 30-day public comment period. The Wells and Egan Field Offices in Elko and Ely districts released a final environmental assessment finding no significant impact and decision record for the gather recently.

Click (HERE) to visit the Elko Daily and to Comment
Related Articles

The case of the missing mustangs; what happened to 1,700 wild horses?

Posted: May 14, 2013 by R.T. Fitch in Horse News, Horse Slaughter, Wild Burros, Wild Horses/Mustangs
Tags: , , , , ,
49

Source: NBC News

The government says Davis, who paid just $10 per head, was the biggest buyer ever of wild horses

By Lisa Myers and Michael Austin
NBC News

The semis would rumble down country roads packed full of wild horses. Truckload after truckload, sometimes 36 horses at a time, all with the same destination: a ranch in the small town of La Jara, Colo.

Records show that for years, the Bureau of Land Management sold and shipped more than 1,700 wild horses from its animal holding facilities to just one rancher. Now federal investigators are trying to figure out:  What did he do with all those mustangs? And did any of them ultimately end up being butchered in the slaughter plants of Mexico?

Wild horse advocates fear the worst. They want to know the truth about the fate of the horses and whether the U.S. government looked the other way as the federally protected animals seemingly disappeared…(CONTINUED)

Click (HERE) to read the story in it’s entirety and to Comment

Related Articles

Colorado Sheriff Opens Wild Horse Slaughter Investigation

Posted: May 8, 2013 by R.T. Fitch in Horse News, Horse Slaughter, Wild Burros
Tags: , , , , ,
37

Source:  By Dave Philipps as published in The Gazette.com

Wild horse advocates believe they illegally went to slaughter

dp_tom_davis_630x420_121110After months of false starts, state authorities have opened a formal criminal investigation into Tom Davis, a southern Colorado wild horse buyer who admitted to breaking state laws while shipping hundreds of federally protected wild horses to an unknown fate out of state.

Last week, the Conejos County Sheriff’s Office opened the investigation at the request of state brand commissioner Chris Whitney, who said Davis, of La Jara, admitted to the commissioner that he broke brand laws.

A ProPublica report published in The Gazette in September detailed how Davis, a proponent of horse slaughter, purchased truckloads of protected wild horses from the Bureau of Land Management. Davis said he then shipped the horses to what he called ‘good homes ‘ all over the country. None of the horses has been accounted for. Wild horse advocates believe they illegally went to slaughter. Davis denies this.

Colorado law requires a state brand inspection when livestock is sold or shipped more than 75 miles. Brand records show Davis received more than 1,700 horses from the BLM, but shipped only 765. None of the horses is in his possession, meaning almost 1,000 were shipped or sold without an inspection.

Davis admitted as much to ProPublica in 2012, saying he did not want brand inspectors to know where the horses were going. When the reporter suggested that was illegal, Davis replied, ‘Since when is anything in this country done legal? ‘

He could not be reached for comment last week.

Each violation of the brand law is misdemeanor punishable by up to 18 months in jail and a $1,000 fine.

After the ProPublica report, state agencies dithered, unsure how to enforce the law. The brand commissioner thought it was the job of the district attorney in Alamosa. The district attorney said it was not. Nothing happened with the case until a Gazette inquiry in early April…(CONTINUED)

Click (HERE) to read the story in it’s entirety

New Interior Secretary Sally Jewell Waiting for Study on Wild Horses?

Posted: May 8, 2013 by R.T. Fitch in Horse News, Horse Slaughter, Wild Burros, Wild Horses/Mustangs
Tags: , , , , , , , ,
23

Source: By Allison Sherry ~ The Denver Post

Mainstream Article, once again, skewed against wild horses and burros…
BLM Antelope attack in 2011 ~ photo by Terry Fitch of Wild Horse Freedom Federation

BLM Antelope attack in 2011 ~ photo by Terry Fitch of Wild Horse Freedom Federation

WASHINGTON — New Interior Secretary Sally Jewell said Tuesday that she is still undecided about how to handle a burgeoning? wild horse and burro population that is eating more than half the horse budget at the BLM and sparking outrage among wild horse advocates.

Jewell said in an interview with The Denver Post that she is awaiting a National Academy of Sciences study, slated to come out in early June (and directed by the BLM not to look at the millions of welfare cattle grazing on the same land), to determine how best to handle the horses.

“It’s going to help identify what’s the sustained capacity of our public lands to handle our wild horses, what is the effectiveness of things like birth control methodology to try and deal with the issue,” Jewell said Tuesday. “So we appreciate their help and we look forward to that response.” (How about the millions of private cattle?)…(CONTINUED)

Comments needed and rest of the story located (HERE)
Related Articles

Horse deaths at BLM’s Palomino Valley facility more than twice as high as reported, rendering receipts reveal

Posted: May 2, 2013 by R.T. Fitch in Horse News, Wild Burros, Wild Horses/Mustangs
Tags: , , , , ,
52

Source: Written by Mark Robison as published on RGJ.com

The discrepancy seems to come about mostly from the counting of baby deaths.

The number of horse deaths at the BLM’s Palomino Valley wild horse facility is vastly underreported, according to rendering receipts uncovered by a Freedom of Information Act request made by the farm animal advocacy group Animals’ Angels.

Animals’ Angels sought the Palomino Valley facility’s rendering receipts for the services of Reno Rendering, whose legal name is Nevada By-Products. Rendering is when animal carcasses are hauled away and processed into other usable materials. (Possible uses: Cartilage, tendons and hooves are turned into gelatin used in such products as Jell-O and Altoids; stearic acid is used in car tires; blood and bone meal can be used for fertilizer; and some tissue is used as “byproducts” in animal feed.)

Animals’ Angels found:

According to the contract paperwork, Nevada By-Products  was chosen over landfill disposal due to cost effectiveness and the fact that “Due to the sensitive nature of the public to the wild horse and burro program, it is necessary to dispose of these large animals as quickly and discretely (sic) as possible and Reno Rendering fulfills these requirements.”

In addition to the contract itself, our FOIA request obtained all records of deceased horses and burros sent from the BLM holding facility to the rendering plant from January 1, 2010 through May 31, 2012.

During that timeframe the BLM itself reported in the official Palomino Valley Mortality Detail Report that only 241 horses and burros died at the Palomino Valley facility and 50 at the Fallon facility. However, the records from the rendering plant tell quite a different story. According to the Nevada By-Product invoices for that same time period, a startling 577 dead horses were received from the Palomino Valley Facility. This is a shocking difference of 286 animals (336 horses if Nevada By-Products does not render the horses from Fallon), a number simply too large to ignore.

The BLM’s Heather Jasinski was asked for comment. She responded:

As for Animals’ Angels and their posting about the discrepancy of numbers of deaths: as stated in my earlier response, the National WH&B Program is currently reviewing its reporting procedures for all aspects of the program and will modify them to correct any identified discrepancies. Until any modifications are identified as being needed, we will continue to respond to any requests based on the current recording procedure.

The discrepancy seems to come about mostly from the counting of baby deaths. They aren’t tracked because they haven’t reached the age where they would be branded and enter “the system.” A controversy is over whether their deaths should be counted in general but also whether they should be counted as negative fallout from roundups, with the thinking being that they may have survived if born in the wild and their mothers hadn’t endured the stress of roundup, confinement and unfamiliar food…(CONTINUED)

Related Articles

BLM Looks to Spaying as Method to Further Decimate Wild Horse Populations

Posted: April 24, 2013 by R.T. Fitch in Horse News, Wild Burros, Wild Horses/Mustangs
Tags: , , , ,
54

Source: By Nancy Lofholm of the Denver Post

Spaying mares in the field would amount to “mutilation.”

GRAND JUNCTION —  The Bureau of Land Management has no new wild-horse roundups planned for the remainder of this year and, in that lull, will be researching a new population-control measure — the promising but controversial spaying of mares in the field.

BLM's war on America's wild horses and burros ` photo by Terry Fitch of Wild Horse Freedom Federation

BLM’s war on America’s wild horses and burros ~ photo by Terry Fitch of Wild Horse Freedom Federation

The BLM is laying out steps to study what are called ovariectomies. Initially, the agency is seeking input from veterinarians about the best way to conduct field spayings. If those veterinarians give the idea a green light, the BLM would try out the procedure in holding facilities, followed by research in the field, before implementing any widespread program.

“We will be proceeding on this soon. It’s a very high priority for us,” said Dean

Bolstad, the BLM’s wild horse and burro senior adviser.

The BLM has had to take a new look at population-control measures because contraceptive drugs haven’t worked well to reduce herd sizes. Birth-control drugs are effective for less than two years and necessitate expensive repeat gathers of the animals. BLM wild-horse managers hope for approval of a more long-acting drug, but that is not expected anytime soon.

The agency is looking at new measures such as spaying because there is a lack of space for more horses in holding facilities, which are already home to more than 37,000 wild horses and burros. Last year, the BLM spent $43 million to maintain those animals in captivity. Adoptions of wild horses have dropped from 7,600 in 2001 to about 2,500 last year.

The ovariectomy became a seriously considered option after the BLM’s Wild Horse and Burro Advisory Board recommended — in an eight-page “Population Growth Suppression Alternative” paper last fall — that it be studied.

The advisory board laid out reasons why removing the ovaries of some mares could be an important part of controlling the population of wild horses in herd-management areas and how it could be done in a more humane way than the roundups the BLM has long relied on to thin herds.

The board recommended using water and food as bait to corral horses long enough to treat them.

“Anytime you can get the BLM to consider something new, that’s good,” said Tim Harvey, the wild-horse advocate on the national advisory board.

Harvey pointed out that ovariectomies are already a government-approved measure and have been used safely on race horses.

“Personally, I do think it can be safe in the field,” said advisory board chairman Dr. Boyd Spratling, who is a veterinarian from Nevada…(CONTINUED)

PLEASE Click (HERE) to read the story in it’s entirety and to publicly comment
Related Articles

Nevada Senate Passes Resolution Supporting Wild Horses?

Posted: April 19, 2013 by R.T. Fitch in Horse News, Wild Burros, Wild Horses/Mustangs
Tags: , , , ,
21
This is a trend that needs to be built upon!!
Wild Horses under attack by BLM in Nevada~ by Terry Fitch of Wild Horse Freedom Federation

Wild Horses under attack by BLM in Nevada~ by Terry Fitch of Wild Horse Freedom Federation

According to a recent AP article it appears that Nevada politicians are pulling pages right out of Ripley’s Believe It or Not for America’s free roaming wild horses and burros by passing a resolution in their honor.

The report states that Senate Joint Resolution 1 recognizes wild horses as living symbols of American Western heritage, as well as natural resources and cultural assets.

SJR1 also expresses support for wild horse and burro eco-sanctuaries, something supporters say could encourage rural tourism in the state.

Only Sens. Debbie Smith of Sparks and Ben Kieckhefer (KEE’-keh-fer) of Reno voted against the resolution.

It now goes to the Assembly.

For a state that has been “Ground Zero”, both federal and local, for the destruction of protected wild horses and burros this comes as somewhat of a surprise to those who strive to protect and ensure the future well being of our national treasures.

Although a nice gesture it is only window dressing as the resolution will not stop the out of control Bureau of Land Management (BLM) from continuing their assault upon our nation’s wild equines, the bulk of which reside in Nevada, as they make up the law and rules as they go.

Related Articles
Older Entries