CHICAGO, (EWA) – BLM is only issuing reports once per week. There were 5 deaths over the past two weeks – 3 deaths the week ending June 18 and 2 deaths the week ending June 25. Below is the current death toll and the information on the deaths from the BLM website.
In the face of public and Congressional outrage over the roundup of nearly 2,000 wild horses from Nevada’s Calico Mountains region, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has announced plans to control and minimize criticism by restricting the very limited public viewing of its operations to a small group of cherry-picked organizations and individuals. The agency is ramping up its capture plans, with over 5,000 more wild horses targeted for roundup and removal over the next four months.
When we were on the June 14, 2010 public tour of the Twin Peaks Herd Management Area (HMA), the BLM said the BIG REASON they had to round-up our wild horses was because there WASN’T ENOUGH WATER. They took us by a spring east of Observation Peak, which was fenced off because it was on PRIVATE PROPERTY. The BLM said this spring fed Smoke Creek, which went south of the area. Aside from the actual spring itself, most of the creek/water runs south on public lands through the Twin Peaks Wilderness Study Area to the Smoke Creek Resevoir. The BLM took us to a cow-poop laden riparian area, showed us what looked like a puddle of water and talked more about how there was hardly any water and how all the creeks dry up in the summer.
Washington, DC (June 22, 2010) – Today, the national law firm of Buchanan Ingersoll & Rooney P.C. (BIR) notified the U.S. Department of Justice that it intends to file suit over the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM’s) proposed roundup and removal of 1,855 wild horses and 210 burros in the Twin Peaks Herd Management Area (HMA) located in Northeastern California.
The Cloud Foundation, with thanks to Xtomic and our website creator, Jay Ferguson, live-streamed the Department of Interior Public Workshop (June 14) and the BLM Public Advisory Board Meeting in Denver, Colorado (June 15). We felt that the public workshop was an excellent start and look forward to future workshops and conference in which the DOI (and specifically BLM) begins to work with the public to manage our wild herds. Step one is to enact an immediate moratorium on the ongoing roundups.
Unless urgent action is taken, wild horses and burros in today’s America face a bleak future. Though the unanimously passed Wild Free Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971 originally set aside somewhere between 53 million and 88 million acres for their preservation in the wild, the rights of these animals and their public supporters have been undermined and denied by the very officials charged with protecting them.
My frustration reaches a peak on a day like today, when I feel all the friends of the wild ones have been taken on a big ride. As usual,the BLM controls the conversation and frames the scope of what is allowed to be discussed. A “workshop” is called, but it is not to discuss anything of significance, it is a PR show to go over the “salazoo plan”, the cattlemens’ plan. The room is full of brilliant and dedicated people who want to effect change and have solutions, yet I feel the BLM is not listening, they are staging an event to be used by their new PR firm to show they are open to public input.
Denver, CO (June 14, 2010)—The Cloud Foundation has learned that the San Francisco based public relations and public affairs firm, Kearns and West, with ties to big energy and offices across the country, has been hired to push the Salazar Plan for Wild Horses and Burros through Congress in Fall 2010—despite public outrage. Kearns and West has expertise in crisis management as well as accomplishing policy and regulatory goals. Their clients range from Mineral Management Services (MMS) and PG&E to Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). The Department of Interior (DOI) has enlisted the firm using the Institute for Environmental Conflict Resolution (ECR) as the go between. Senior mediator of Kearns and West, J. Michael Harty will facilitate an unprecedented public workshop in Denver, Colorado at the Magnolia Hotel, 818 17th Street, on June 14th followed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Public Advisory Board Meeting on June 15th. Both days will be live-streamed and viewing available on http://www.thecloudfoundation.org. The public and members of Congress are encouraged to watch. The public will protest on June 15th from 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. with a press conference at noon.
The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has closed and locked the gates of the Broken Arrow feed lot facility outside of Fallon Nevada while disregarding public outcry over the insufficient care of 2,000+ wild horses being imprisoned there.
I am concerned about the fate of Calico complex wild horses now in captivity north of Fallon as well as those that remain living in the wild in the five HMA’s from which the former where captured. I recently flew over southern and central portions of Black Rock East, Black Rock West, Calico Mountain, and Granite Range HMA’s in a light plane. In this very open area I was only able to observe only 31 wild horses in several bands, while during this same flight I observed 350 cattle. There was a reasonable spring green-up of the landscape and the open treeless character of the terrain permitted a high degree of horse detection.
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