photo by Carol Walker
by Bonnie Kohleriter
In the proposal supported by the ASPCA, HSUS, Return to Freedom and the American Mustang Foundation, they propose helping the BLM to increase the adoptions for 45,000-60,000 wild horses and burros they want to remove from public lands in only 3 years.
The ASPCA has claimed ”In 2017, Edge Research identified 2.3 million adults who have both the resources and the desire to adopt a horse right now. This means that the BLM’s adoptions each year could increase significantly with our groups’ promotion and expertise.”
However, Bonnie Kohleriter questions this and notes the following:
This study was based on domestic horses, not wild horses and burros.
The ASPCA cites a study in ANIMAL, “Estimation of the Availability of Potential Homes for Unwanted Horses in the United States” to show evidence of potential placements for mustangs, if communication is increased.
This study suggests 1.25 million households are available for taking horses. The study suggests we just need to better communicate between organizations with “unwanted horses” and applicants that will take horses in order to get the horses adopted.
So, the 3036 people called represent entire the U.S. population. 16 of those people called represents people qualified to take horses, people interested in taking horses and people who have had a horse in the last 5 years. 16 of those people called also represents 1.25 million households and 2.18 million people.
But would the 16 people representing 2.18 million United States citizens be qualified to take wild horses and to have the set up?
ASPCA uses this one study to claim increased adoptions for wild horses & burros are possible what, for 12, 000 yearly, 20,000 yearly, 60+ thousand over 3-5 years? ASPCA suggests you just need to increase communication between the BLM gathering horses and the applicant.
Does this study give you facts by which to conclude adoptions in good, safe, long term homes can be increased from 3000+ currently to 12,000, 20,000, 60,000 or 132,000 for mustangs, simply by increased communication?
Does the number “16” give you confidence that 2.18 million individuals are waiting out there to adopt our mustangs, if we just talk more to them?
It is my opinion that the evidence isn’t there to substantiate the specific proposals presented in Rep. Chris Stewart’s proposal to Congress titled “The Path Forward for Management of BLM’s Wild Horses & Burros,” and certainly not for increased adoptions.
It is a tragedy that our Congressional members know so little about our wild horses and burros and that they may not know enough to call out these simplistic, non-credible, unrealistic actions presented by the participants of this plan.
Categories: Wild Burros, Wild Horses/Mustangs
Straight from the Horse's Heart 
Totally delusional people who we are supposed to support for the welfare of the innocent ones?? Makes me feel very angry.. Oh yes, “Denial is a river in Egypt”.. 😵😠
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Sadly, not only Congress but a large number of the public have no clue what it would mean to adopt a WILD horse. The fact is people with little or no experience with any large animal dont comprehend what care is needed – how many ways there are to get hurt when you dont know what you are doing – the COST of feed, fencing, vet bills, farriers – none of that. And that sure isnt addressed in the ASPCA’s little “research”! And when one of these adoptions doesnt “work out” – what happens to the horse? Ask any number of sanctuaries or rescues. It happens to domestic animals every day. EVERY SINGLE DAY.
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Perfectly stated Maggie!
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I have seen them on Craig’s List Maggie
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After seeing multiple BLM branded horses in a slaughter auction yard, I asked Debbie Collins (BLM public relations) about this. She responded:
“If I understand your question correctly, you are asking how BLM knows a purchaser did not go against the statement they signed upon purchase of an animal. If we learned that a purchaser went directly from picking up the horse at a BLM location to a slaughter buyer, etc. then yes we would have a case; otherwise, they can change their mind a month later and resell the animal without penalty.”
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Perfectly stated also.. I totally agree with you!
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It is against the law to sell an adopted wild horse to slaughter until you own it, which takes a year to get title.
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“Wild horses are not saddle horses in waiting. They do not belong in our backyards, corrals or show rings. They belong in the wild where they can be free and separate from humans.”
– Barbara Clarke
https://rtfitchauthor.com/2016/11/28/in-memory-of-barbara-clarke-co-founder-managing-director-of-dreamcatcher-wild-horse-burro-sanctuary/
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Meanwhile, trespass grazing seems to be fine with the BLM, and reporting it enough to get a whistleblower fired:
For Immediate Release: May 29, 2019
Contact: Kirsten Stade (202) 265-7337
BLOWING WHISTLE ON RANGE VIOLATIONS UNWELCOME IN BLM
BLM Fires 21-Year Veteran Whistleblower Rather than Curtailing Illegal Grazing
Posted on May 29, 2019 | Tags: BLM, Grazing Reform, Nevada
Washington, DC – The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has removed a highly-respected range management veteran who repeatedly reported illegal grazing in the Ely, Nevada, area. In a challenge filed today, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) charges that this discharge was illegal retaliation in violation of the Whistleblower Protection Act.
During 2018, Craig Hoover, a 21-year BLM veteran, reported numerous violations, including grazing trespass in areas outside of permits and in excess of permit limits, and stolen fencing materials. BLM’s Ely Field Office took no enforcement action but instead fired Mr. Hoover.
BLM relied upon two seemingly pretextual reasons as the basis for termination: a four-hour delay in Mr. Hoover’s locating one permittee’s permit paperwork and misplacing his own ID badge for about five minutes inside the Field Office’s breakroom. On his behalf, PEER is petitioning the federal Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) to reinstate Mr. Hoover.
“In our more than 25-year history, we have never seen a termination based on flimsier grounds,” stated PEER Senior Counsel Peter Jenkins, noting that Mr. Hoover had a solid performance record. “It buggers the mind that BLM’s stated rationale was the real reason for this extreme action, strongly suggesting that it is a clumsy official effort to silence a squeaky wheel.”
According to documents obtained by PEER it appears that BLM has simply stopped enforcement against illegal grazing, not just in Nevada but across the West. Under President Trump, BLM employees have also been encouraged to wear “Vision Cards” depicting overgrazed rangeland.
These incidents also spring from the same region as the infamous Bundy family stand-off over longstanding grazing trespass in 2014. The upshot inside BLM of the years-long Bundy experience has been increased professional pressure not to inflame ranchers–and physical fear, as well. A 2017 PEER survey of Western BLM staff revealed that 70% of BLM respondents feel the Bundy episodes have made their jobs “more dangerous” with large percentages citing “threats to our safety due to resource management issues.”
“As Mr. Hoover’s case illustrates, in today’s BLM, range staff trying to do their jobs must cast a profile in courage,” Jenkins added. “As a consequence, America’s rangelands are deliberately left unprotected by the public agency charged with their stewardship.”
Before the MSPB, the agency bears the burden of showing both that the charges have merit and that the penalty is appropriate. MSPB can order reinstatement and back pay with interest. In addition, if BLM managers are found to have violated the Whistleblower Protection Act, MSPB can direct that the responsible officials be subjected to discipline, including removal.
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From Photojournalist-Journalist
Wild Horse Sterilization Government Programs: Ethics? Morals? or Humane Decay (excerpts)
Sterilization of Wild Horses on Public Lands? We see an ongoing travesty here, within government agencies of the Bureau of Land Management, the Humane Society, the Wild Horse and Burro Board, and other affiliated non-profits and corporations alike – the Travesty?
The travesty, in reality an ethical and moral horror show, is the fact the sterilization of wild horse’s entire premise, yes, the very basis of reasoning for it, remains and is false. Yes, a lie of tremendous proportions, and its ongoing misrepresentation of facts . . .
The Nazi propaganda program took advantage of a well-developed German film industry that was already being retooled as an instrument of the state in order to maintain and expand backing for the regime. The general pattern of slick, well-produced films utilized repetition of misleading and erroneous scientific information and statistics, coupled with powerful emotional images that confirmed pre-existing prejudices and stereotypes. These techniques were particularly effective when applied to the forced sterilization program and to the euthanasia program that would follow when public opinion was sufficiently prepared.
These techniques were also used to inform and indoctrinate those personally involved in carrying out the initiatives and to help maintain their level of commitment.
We defeated the Nazi’s – not from hatred, but from motivated paradigms from such honesty as the difference between Right and Wrong – and a truth from all of our hearts that life is to be respected and cherished – not slaughtered or sterilized out of existence!
https://prophoto7journal.wordpress.com/wild-horse-sterilization-government-programs-ethics-morals-or-humane-decay/
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The general public has no idea of what is happening to our wild horses much less Congress. Just ask them and then tell them. As for adoptions no follow up is done usually. This whole plan is for extinction.
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