On October 27th the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) issued a press release stating that it would hold a “media day” at two of its mid-western wild horse long term holding facilities November 9th and within minutes Horseback Magazine (HB) editor Steven Long responded to the BLM’s Washington D.C. public affairs officer, Tom Gorey, that HB correspondent Laura Leigh and chief HB photographer Terry Fitch would be in attendance.
While the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) sends mixed signals over the state of New Mexico’s attempt to establish a state run Wild Horse sanctuary Governor Bill Richardson stands firm in his conviction that the wild horses need proper protection.
The BLM’s comment period for the Augusta Mountains HMA Preliminary EA for a Wild Horse Gather closes on 11/6. Please take the time to email your comments to Jerome Fox at AugustaMts_HMA_PrelimEA@blm.gov (mailing address and fax are in the letter). This plan is to capture 344 horses, including 50 outside the HMA. Mares captured within the HMA are to be treated with the contraceptive PZP-22 and released, the 50 horses outside the HMA are to be removed to adoption facilities.
It didn’t take long; only several weeks ago New Mexico announced plans to purchase 12,000 acres of private land with the intent to turn a portion of the property into a wild horse sanctuary and already the federal Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is attempting to interject itself squarly into the middle of the state’s proposal.
Ah, the BLM, as usual busy destroying horses’ lives and human jobs. On October 15th 2010, a BLM contractor helicopter drove a frightened young, wild foal so relentlessly that the foal broke a leg, wranglers shoot him and hauled his mother away for adoption or a lifetime holding pen. Local people lose another opportunity to prosper with their wild horses. The road not taken. Let’s go down that road…
U.S. District Judge William H. Pauley, III, sitting in the Eastern District of New York, observed in his ruling on October 21, 2010 that “the Court is accustomed to dealing with bulls and bears on Wall Street, [but] this case turns its attention westward to wild horses in Colorado”.
Judge Pauley then proceeded to deny a motion by plaintiffs Habitat for Horses, American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA), The Cloud Foundation, Toni Moore and Dr. Don Moore, for an injunction to stop the Bureau of Land Management’s roundup of wild horses in the North Piceance Herd Area in Colorado.
Today, lead counsel Bruce Wagman, of the Schiff Hardin law firm, reported that the TRO hearing for the Habitat for Horses, ASPCA, Cloud Foundation, Toni and Dr. Don Moore suit against the BLM for rounding up wild horses in the Colorado North Piceance area has netted several positive results for both the horses and the American public.
Without any drama and absent of any fanfare I would simply like to state that behind the scenes there are many, many people actively engaged in attempting to do what is right for the wild horses.
Legal documents were filed in Reno, NV on October 4, 2010 adding to the Temporary Restraining Order Motion that was filed earlier by Laura Leigh against Ken Salazar, Dept. of Interior, Robert Abbey, Bureau of Land Management and Ron Wenker, NV State Director of BLM.
Caliente, NV, CRWE Newswire (October 6, 2010) — Today’s death of a mustang stallion at a U.S. Interior Department wild horse roundup is re-igniting controversy over the federal wild horse program, which has been harshly criticized, most recently by 54 members of Congress. Despite severe restrictions on the public’s ability to observe all aspects of the roundups, the death of the wild stallion was captured on video by wild horse advocates at the Silver King Herd Management Area in southeastern Nevada.
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