Last year Rep. Chris Stewart (R-Utah) proposed an amendment to the 2018 budget that would have allowed for the destruction of healthy, unadopted, wild horses and burros.  This would have led to the massive killing of horses and burros on the range and in long and short term holding.  This language went all the way through the budget process where it was finally removed by the Senate, where the original language was restored, and funding was not made available for the destruction of our wild horses and burros. 

The 2019 proposed budget has the following language, which is the same language that was passed last year:
“Appropriations herein made shall not be available for the destruction of healthy, unadopted, wild horses and burros in the care of the Bureau or its contractors or for the sale of wild horses and burros that results in their destruction for processing into commercial products.”

Due to outrage by the public - that would be your calls, your emails, and your faxes - Rep. Stewart seems to realize that outright, massive slaughter of our wild ones is not acceptable to the majority of Americans.  So he’s taking a different approach this year.  This year he proposed an amendment that adds language to the bill that states:

“. . . the Secretary of the Interior may hereafter manage any group of wild horses or burros as a non-reproducing or single-sex herd, in whole or in part, including through chemical or surgical sterilization.”

On Wednesday, June 6, 2018, the House Appropriations Committee approved the fiscal year 2019 Interior and Environmental Appropriations Bill on a voice vote of 25-20. 

Although PZP may be utilized, it’s more likely they will resort to more permanent forms of sterilization such as gelding stallions.  It also means they could perform widespread field spays on mares.  This procedure is rare in domestic horses due to the high possibility of internal bleeding, and surgical complications.  Mares are hospitalized for about a week post-surgery.  Unlike cats and dogs that are spayed in a sterile environment, spaying a horse in the field adds the increased risk of infection on top of surgical complications, making this a risky procedure at best. 

What this means is that BLM could “manage” wild horse and burro herds so that they become EXTINCT in a matter of 20 or so years.  With no new foals being born, once existing horses die off, the herds will cease to exist.  That is if they haven’t zeroed out all of the herds before then.  BLM has just announced plans to zero out the Seaman & White River Herd Area in Nevada over the next 10 years. 

This was not the intent of the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971:
“Congress finds and declares that wild free-roaming horses and burros are living symbols of the historic and pioneer spirit of the West; that they contribute to the diversity of life forms within the Nation and enrich the lives of the American people; and that these horses and burros are fast disappearing from the American scene. It is the policy of Congress that wild free-roaming horses and burros shall be protected from capture, branding, harassment, or death; and to accomplish this they are to be considered in the area where presently found, as an integral part of the natural system of the public lands.”

Since this proposed bill language is more palatable to lawmakers, and even many of the public than mass killing, and would appear to be a “solution” to the “overpopulation” of wild horses and burros, it has a very high probability of passing.  Make no mistake, this is part of a concerted effort to eradicate wild horses and burros from public lands.  This assault on our wild horses and burros as well as other native wildlife will never end unless cattle and sheep grazing is discontinued on our public lands.
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What you can do:
Please contact the Senators on the Interior Appropriations Subcommittee and tell them to:

• Oppose any amendments that would allow BLM to manage wild horses and burros as same sex herds or sterilized herds.  Spaying mares is dangerous, especially for wild mares. 
• Oppose any language that removes protections from horses that are transferred to other government agencies.
• Place a moratorium on wild horse and burro roundups.  Cattle and sheep outnumber horses and burros on public lands up to 50:1, yet horses and burros are blamed for range degradation.  Our tax dollars are subsidizing grazing permits and used to eradicate wildlife to protect cattle and sheep on public lands.   Tax dollars are used to remove horses from the wild then pay ranchers to care for horses on private land. 

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The following Senators are Committee Members:

CHAIR Sen. Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) 202-224-6665
RANKING MEMBER Sen. Tom Udall (New Mexico) 202-224-6621
DEMOCRAT MEMBERS:
Sen. Dianne Feinstein (California) 202-224-3841
Sen. Patrick Leahy (Vermont) 202-224-4242
Sen. Jack Reed (Rhode Island) 202-224-4642
Sen. Jon Tester (Montana) 202-224-2644
Sen. Jeff Merkley (Oregon) 202-224-3753
Sen. Chris Van Hollen (Maryland) 202-224-4654
REPUBLICAN MEMBERS
Sen. Lamar Alexander (Tennessee) 202-224-4944
Sen. Roy Blunt (Missouri) 202-224-5721
Sen. Mitch McConnell (Kentucky) 202-224-2541
Sen. Steve Daines (Montana) 202-224-2651
Sen. Shelley Moore Caputo (West Virginia) 202-224-6472
Sen. Marco Rubio (Florida) 202-224-3041
Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith (Mississippi) 202-224-5054

Please call these Senators, especially if you reside in their state.
Or if you prefer to write a letter and fax it, click on the button below (no fax machine necessary):

​FINALLY, some good news!! The Senate Appropriations Committee passed the Udall-Graham (Coons-Feinstein-Reed-Collins-Shaheen) Amendment which would prevent the USDA from funding horse slaughterhouse inspections. Similar language did not pass by a vote of 25-27 in the House Appropriations Committee. What this means is the Senate and the House now have to work together to reconcile the two bills (one from the House and one from the Senate). So now is the time to contact both your Congressman/woman and your Senators and let them know you support language in the Agricultural Bill that does not fund horsemeat inspection, which would pave the way to open horse slaughterhouses in the US. Since Congress takes a recess in August, please contact your representatives at their home offices. 
There's still work to do, and we can't let up just yet, but this shows that we need to keep reaching out to our legislators to let them know we don't support horse slaughter in the US.

​I would like to comment on the proposed research projects “to develop new or improve existing population growth suppression methods for wild horses.”

Altogether there are eight different research projects ranging from 6 months to 4 years in duration that involve finding ways to evaluate, assess or develop permanent sterilization for wild mares. 

According to the Panel to Assess Spay Techniques for Mares in Field Conditions (9/24/15), Dr. Pielstick has performed colpotomies on 188 mares with only 2 fatalities.  Some of those mares were from the Sheldon National Wildlife Refuge, and in 2014 we received 8 of those mares, all in their 20’s, along with 8 intact mares.  We also received 36 vasectomized studs (however we had two foals born this year, so the vasectomies are not 100%).  In addition we received 19 geldings. 

We’ve observed that the spayed mares continue to be receptive to studs, and the intact mares continue to cycle into heat, and because neither group of mares are bred, the studs fight constantly over the mares.  No doubt it does not help that the ratio of mares to studs is 1:2 (not including geldings), but the fact that the mares do not conceive, there is no lull in the breeding cycle as there would be if the mares were bred, creating instability within the herd.  Currently we’ve separated the mares and studs/gelding to create peace among all the horses.

Trap-neuter-return of feral cats (where cats are spayed/neutered, then returned to their colony) is being used by animal care and control agencies because it has been proven to reduce and eventually eliminate feral cat colonies in communities.  It is not necessary to spay/neuter the entire colony to get this result.  The sterilization and re-release of mares follows this model and will lead to the extinction of many herds, due to suppressed reproduction and a reduction of long term herd health.  The goal of all this research is to reduce the number of horses on public lands over time through permanent sterilization, with extinction being the ultimate goal.

Some herds are already below genetic viability (less than 150 horses).

Permanent sterilization of mares will reduce genetic viability and long term health of the herd, much more so than the reduction of intact studs.

According to the National Academy of Sciences 2013 report, there is no scientific basis used by BLM to determine the number of horses on the range, nor does BLM actually know how many horses are on the range, or what appropriate AMLs are for each HMA.

Manipulating herd genetics, reproduction and dynamics was not the intention of the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971, which was enacted to preserve wild horses and burros on the land where they were found, and keep them free from slaughter and harassment from man.

Finding real, viable solutions would require focusing on getting more accurate population counts, along with developing realistic AMLs based on the horses/burros being the PRIMARY users of the HMAs.  The second half of that equation would be focusing on reintroducing predators wherever possible in order to maintain stable populations naturally. 

The research to find “new and improved” permanent sterilization for wild mares is not only unnecessary because there is no wild horse or burro overpopulation, but it is redundant, has already been shown to be detrimental to herd health, and will result in the eventual elimination of wild horses from our public lands.

Respectfully submitted,

Tracy Mohr, founder
The Mustang Project
P.O. Box 1161
Corning, CA 96021