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This Article is about Wild Horses and the natural effects against horses when BLM doesn't round them up.

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The ecological consequences of poor grazing management in the desert ecosystems of the American West's Great Basin can be severe. To find out how severe, I met Dr. Barry Perryman, rangeland ecology professor at the University of Nevada, at a dry water well near the 230,000-acre Fish Creek Complex Herd Management Area on public lands managed overseen by the Bureau of Land Management near Eureka, Nevada.

About 50 wild horses greeted us and stood around the well, waiting for BLM staff to fill it up because there isn't enough naturally occurring water to keep the horses alive. The BLM's Appropriate Management Level-the population of horses for a thriving natural ecological balance-here is between 101 and 170 horses, but the current population is nearing 500, pretty standard overpopulation rate for Nevada wild horse herds. Statewide, the appropriate management level is 12,800, but the current population is estimated to be more than 34,000.

I had questions for Perryman about the landscape, threats to the local ecosystems, and the possibly fate of the wild horses that call the rangeland home.

Ben Masters: What did this land look like before European settlement, livestock grazing, and the introduction of exotic plants?

Barry Perryman: How far back do you want to go? What is pristine and what is natural? Lots of people want to replicate the land to what it looked like when Lewis and Clark came out here in 1804, but that was at the tail end of a 300-year mini ice age, and no matter what we do, we can't replicate that. But why 1804? Why don't we go back thousands of years to the altithermal period, a 3,000-year-long drought that would've made this landscape now look like a rainforest? We can't replicate the past. We've put fences on highways, developed infrastructure, introduced exotic plants, and forever changed the ecology of these landscapes. What we can do is plan for the future and manage the land using the best available science to provide habitat, conserve biodiversity, and control exotic plants that we've introduced.

A lot of wildlife biologists, ecologists, and conservation organizations blame wild horses for rangeland damage. Why?

Wild horses aren't at fault. Wild horses are here making a living like every other animal. The fault lies in management. Up until the Taylor Grazing Act was passed in 1934, this area was a grazing free-for-all for anyone with the courage to come out here and bring livestock. It's undeniable that historic unregulated livestock grazing contributed to erosion and overgrazing, and we still occasionally see some of those legacy effects today. The science of rangeland ecology hadn't come along yet and the ranching industry didn't understand the dynamics of the ecosystems they were using. Public land ranching today is highly regulated. But any population of unmanaged large herbivores in an area, even if it's a million acres, without predators can ultimately cause vegetation damage, whether its deer, elk, cows, sheep, horses, or bison."

What exactly is overgrazing?

"Grazing isn't a noun. Grazing is a verb made up of three components: timing, duration, and intensity. Timing is what time of year the grazing occurs. Duration is the amount of time the grazing occurs, and intensity is the amount of animals doing the grazing. There are three main grazing categories that we manage: big game such as elk, deer, and pronghorn; wild horses and burros, and livestock. We can't do much about timing and duration of big game animals; they're out there year long and can go anywhere they want. But the intensity, the population size of the big game animals, is managed through predators such as coyotes and mountain lions or through culls and permitted hunting licenses.

All three components of grazing are managed for livestock, mainly cattle and sheep. The BLM tells the rancher how many cattle he or she can graze, how long they can graze, and what time of year they can graze. Wild horses and burros are more similar to big game animals in management except they have limited predators and no hunting permits to manage the grazing intensity or population size. Instead they are rounded up by the BLM. But now that the BLM has stopped conducting enough roundups because they're spending all their budget warehousing unwanted horses, they've allowed wild horses and burros in some areas to become three times, five times, or even 10 times more than the appropriate management level.

This creates a massive problem for the rangeland because the horses are putting unmanaged pressure on forage all day, every day, for the entire year. Eventually, that landscape reaches a threshold where native high-forage-value plants lose the ability to compete with unpalatable, undesirable, or nonnative species. Those undesirable species could then take over a landscape. In the case of cheatgrass, that has the consequence of creating an unnatural fire cycle than can forever change the ecology of the land. The problem isn't the wild horses; the problem is the inability for the BLM to manage the wild horses at a population size the landscape can healthily sustain.

What is cheatgrass, and how bad can it get?

Cheatgrass is an Asiatic, introduced annual grass that has taken over about 50 million acres of the American West. It is found on about 100 million acres. The problem with cheatgrass is that it's unpalatable for much of the year and it changes the fire regime. Instead of fires occurring every 100-plus years, cheatgrass can increase the fire regime to every three to seven years, which doesn't allow enough time for many of the important brushy species to grow back. The more fires there are, the more prevalent the cheatgrass becomes.

As for how bad it can get? I call it the cinder bowl-a play on words of the Dust Bowl that occurred in the 1930s. If we don't change our management practices to tackle this problem and we continue to lose acreage to cheatgrass monocultures, we could experience fires that are millions of acres, even tens of millions of acres, in size, every single year in the Great Basin. This would affect air quality in Salt Lake City, Reno, Boise and other communities, drastically reduce forage availability, and be the potential nail in the coffin for some local populations of endangered or threatened species.

But this doesn't have to happen. We have in our management arsenal the tools to manage cheatgrass and conserve native plant communities and the wildlife that depend on them. Lots of people think of the wild horse and burro issue as a political one, as a battle between ranchers and wild horses, and we need to start considering the ecological consequences of continuing to allow unmanaged, exponential growth of wild horses.

What does your crystal ball predict for the wild horses and burros in Nevada?

It's not pretty. I think there will be an implosion. We have dysfunctionality in the box; we can make the box bigger by taking away more land and forage from wildlife and livestock, but then we would just have more dysfunctionality in an even bigger box. This would buy us time, but eventually we'll have to make a hard decision or the hard decision will be made for us. If we continue down this path of unregulated breeding and mismanagement, the BLM's wild horse populations will continue to expand to, say, 100,000, 120,000, or 150,000, maybe more, depending on how many good precipitation years we have.

But eventually a bad winter or extended drought will occur. When that happens, natural regulation will take place. Wild horses and burros could begin starving by the tens of thousands along with the mule deer, elk, pronghorn, and other native wildlife. During the process, all available forage will be under extreme grazing pressure and the ecology of the landscape could be damaged for generations. When the public sees the horses starving to death, there will be an outcry for the BLM to gather them to save their lives. The horses will then be warehoused for the rest of their lives and saved.

But what about the rangeland and everything that depends on it? How is it fair to the reptiles, songbirds, small mammals, pronghorn, and future generations of people to inherit a degraded rangeland that we could have prevented?

How do you define good land management?

That is an interesting question. It has to do with the future. What do we want in the future? What do we want to leave, in terms of legacy, to future generations of humans, landscapes, and wildlife? To me it boils down to resilience. If we have resilient landscapes, with lots of biodiversity in the wildlife and vegetation structure, then they will be able to persevere through whatever changes may occur, whether that will be climate changes, drought cycles, wet cycles, fire, war, you name it. The land will be able to face those things. The more resilient our landscapes are, the better off they, and we, will be in the future.

Searching for Solutions

Perryman's bleak prediction is already a reality in some areas. During the summer of 2015, public outcry over starving horses in the Cold Creek Area of the Wheeler Pass Herd Management Area just west of Las Vegas, Nevada, pressured the BLM to act. The photos were hard to look at: starving foals suckling from mothers who were just skin and bone; horses with their ribs and hips protruding, too weak to be rounded up. Forage conditions were so dire the horses were eating spiny Joshua trees. The Appropriate Management Level for the herd management area is 47 to 66 wild horses and 20 to 35 burros, but the estimated population was about 400 horses and 150 burros. The BLM conducted an emergency roundup of more than 200 animals, and vets made the decision to euthanize 30 desperately weak individuals. The gathered horses were put up for adoption, and some will likely live in a holding facility for the rest of their lives along with 45,000 other wild horses already locked up.

There isn't a lot of agreement between different interest groups regarding public lands grazing and the wild horse and burro issue. Wild horse activists often claim "welfare ranchers" have caused tremendous ecological damage, shouldn't receive government subsidies, that wild horses should receive forage priority on public lands, and that public lands ranchers are costing taxpayers a huge amount of money. Proponents of public land ranching claim that managed grazing is an efficient way to eradicate invasive plants, feeds humans, and stimulates rural economies. And, they argue that public land ranching preserves the livelihoods of cowboys, which are often dependent on public lands and equally or more important than conserving the wild horses.

Meanwhile, many wildlife organizations question why livestock are at the center of a public lands grazing battle when native animals like bison, bighorn sheep, elk, pronghorn, mule deer, wolves, and grizzlies still have lots of room to expand to their historic ranges since being nearly eliminated a century ago.

Nationwide, the BLM currently authorizes 8.6 million animal unit monthlys (AUMs) to ranchers to graze livestock on 150 million acres of BLM public lands. This is fewer than half of the 18 million AUMs issued in the 1950s. In comparison, there are approximately 75,000 wild horses, three times the Appropriate Management Level, effectively utilizing 900,000 AUMs on the 31.2 million acres designated for wild horses.

In 2013, the most recent year I could acquire forage allocation data, the BLM gave out nearly 1.1 million livestock AUMs to ranchers in the Herd Management Areas that were shared with wild horses. Since then, some of those livestock AUMs were decreased due to lack of forage, resulting in the nationwide ratio of wild horse AUMs to livestock AUMs to be about 1:1. This ratio can and does change due to rescinded cattle and livestock permits during drought, rising horse populations, and livestock AUMs reduced due to forage competition by wild horse. In some Herd Management Areas, there is still forage to take away from livestock operators to give to horses. In other areas, especially where horses are up to 10 times over appropriate management level, all or most of the forage has already been taken away from livestock permit holders. Bison, the undisputed native large herbivore in North America, are nonexistent on these same lands.

Every wild horse advocate, rancher, ecologist, BLM employee, biologist, and citizen I've interviewed about the complex issue agrees on only one thing: that natural regulation, thousands of horses starving to death, and the destruction of millions of acres of public lands is the very worst scenario possible. But managing excess wild horses is an emotional subject that politicians, public figures, and even the press avoid. Some organizations have filed lawsuits or launched campaigns to sway public opinion toward prohibiting management solutions, including population control, euthanasia, sale, roundups, slaughter, or culls. While the stagnation within the BLM, state governments, and Congress continues, wild horse populations grow exponentially.

Is there a sustainable solution that is publicly acceptable to all stakeholders? I went to the 22,000-acre Spring Creek Basin HMA in southwest Colorado to find out if wild horse advocate TJ Holmes' technique-slowing population growth with fertility control-was the key.

Ben Masters is a filmmaker, writer, and horse hand who splits his time between Bozeman, Montana, and Austin, Texas. Masters studied wildlife management at Texas A&M University, is a proud owner of six mustangs, and serves as wildlife management chair for the volunteer BLM Wild Horse and Burro Advisory Board. Masters is best known for Unbranded, an adventure documentary where he and three friends adopted wild horses and rode 3,000 miles across the American West to inspire people to adopt mustangs. This four-part series and short film presents his experiences, research, and interviews on the controversial wild horse issue in the United States.

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Wild Horses: The Consequences of Doing Nothing

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The ecological consequences of poor grazing management in the desert ecosystems of the American West's Great Basin can be severe. To find out how severe, I met Dr. Barry Perryman, rangeland ecology professor at the University of Nevada, at a dry water well near the 230,000-acre Fish Creek Complex Herd Management Area on public lands managed overseen by the Bureau of Land Management near Eureka, Nevada.

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Sources/Work Cited

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Sources for Saving wild horses (padlet) - Google Docs

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Literay nonfiction padlet reflection - Google Docs

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Mustangs have been a part of the landscape of the United States for centuries. Ever since the first horses escaped from Spanish conquistadors, feral horses have returned to their wild roots, roaming in small family bands lead by stallions, mixing with various breeds of other escapees - including the Appaloosas and paints of Native Americans, ranchers' quarter horses and cow ponies, thoroughbreds and draft horses that ditched their farms.

The mustang has become an exceptionally hardy breed of horse, adapting easily to rough and arid conditions in the west, with isolated bands still showing their centuries-old ancestry though particular conformation and markings. And importantly, the mustang is a breed we equate with freedom, an untamed spirit and the history of our country.

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is tasked to uphold the 1971 legislation written to protect these free-roaming horses, the Wild Free Roaming Horses and Burros Act. Unfortunately, the BLM's strategies are far from effective and are considered by many to be inhumane. The issue is complex and has many conflicting interests, from those who want to see wild horses stay free, to those who object to the strategies used for limiting herd growth, to ranchers who graze their livestock on public land and view the mustangs as competition.

Most recently, wild horses and the BLM made headlines in December over a new Trump administration proposal that would accelerate the roundup and removal of 130,000 federally protected wild horses and burros from public lands.

Two national horse protection groups and a bipartisan group of lawmakers spoke out against the decision, which is part of an Interior Department spending bill.

"Congress just unleashed a catastrophic assault on America's cherished wild horses and burros, turning back the clock 50 years to a time when these iconic animals were almost extinct and Congress acted unanimously to protect them," Suzanne Roy, executive director of the American Wild Horse Campaign, said in a statement.

Roy also spoke out in late July 2017 when a Congressional committee voted to reverse a ban on euthanizing healthy wild horses and burros.

If the amendment had become law, the BLM would have been permitted to kill animals deemed unadoptable that are being kept in holding pens or that are still roaming public lands.

After nearly two years of back and forth, the euthanasia option was taken off the table, the Associated Press reports.

Here are some of the basics of the controversy surrounding one of the most iconic animals in the United States.

Mustangs by the numbers

The mustang population is under strain. As of March 2019, the BLM estimates there are 88,000 wild horses on some 27 million acres of federally managed land. Meanwhile, millions of privately-owned cattle graze across some 155 million acres of public lands, including those acres designated for wild horses.

Wild horses and burros can be found mainly on government-designated Herd Management Areas (HMA) in 10 western states: Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah and Wyoming.

BLM has reduced designated wild horse habitat by more than 15 million acres since 1971.

Livestock versus mustangs on public lands

The American mustang is outnumbered 35 to 1 by the privately owned livestock allowed to graze on public lands.

Livestock grazing on public lands costs taxpayers in excess of $500 million annually. The cattle grazed on public lands provide a mere 3% of the U.S. beef supply.

Cattle are more damaging to fragile riparian habitats than horses. Studies have shown wild horses roam much farther from water sources than cattle, which tend to graze within one mile of water sources, causing erosion, overgrazing and contamination. However, public land fencing often prevents horses from accessing natural water sources and disrupts their natural widespread grazing patterns.

Mustangs are restricted to just 17% of BLM lands. Still, the BLM allocates the majority of forage resources in management areas to private livestock instead of mustangs and burros.

The value of legal protection

Mustangs technically have legal protection. In 1971, Congress passed the Wild Free Roaming Horses and Burros Act, declaring "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."

Population growth is not regulated by self-limiting pressures, such as lack of water or forage and presence of natural predators. Because of this, mustang populations grow at an annual rate of 15-20%.

Despite successful reproduction rates, the breed is still in danger because the BLM is taking so many wild horses out of HMAs. The BLM's target number for mustangs left in the wild is lower than the estimated population in 1971 when the act was passed.

Trauma of roundups and holding pens

Mustangs are often injured or die during or as a result of government roundups, according to the American Wild Horse Campaign. Leg and hoof injuries from running over rough terrain, injuries from panicking in pens, dehydration and over-heating, spontaneous abortions by mares after the strenuous roundup, foals that collapse or are separated from their mothers in the commotion, stallions fighting after being forced into pens together, permanent mental trauma and other significant injuries are the result of "gathers."

Most mustangs rounded up don't get adopted, as BLM reports show. Due to BLM's rounding up horses into long- and short-term holding facilities, there are more mustangs in government holding facilities than there are in the wild.

Budgetary breakdowns

Long-term holding costs consume over half of the Wild Horse and Burro Program's annual budget. In fiscal year 2012, the BLM spent over $40 million to care for more than 45,000 mustangs removed from the range and put in holding.

The BLM focuses the majority of its budget on roundups, removal and warehousing of horses. As of May 2019, there were more than 49,000 horses and burros being kept in holding facilities with the agency estimating it would cost $1 billion to care for the animals over their lifetime.

Mustangs captured in government roundups have commonly ended up in slaughterhouses in Canada and Mexico after being sold. In 2013, new rules for mustang adoptions were put into place after an investigation discovered nearly 1,800 horses were sold to a livestock hauler who most likely sent the horses to slaughter. Now, no more than four mustangs can be adopted by an individual within a six-month period unless prior approval is obtained from the BLM.

Herd management flaws

After two years of review, the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) released a report that shows how the BLM's management of wild herds is ineffective and unscientific, with suggestions for improvement.

The NAS report notes that the BLM does not use scientific methods for estimating the number of horses in an area, monitoring herds or calculating how many horses an area can reasonably sustain. The NAS supports herd management on the range as a more economically viable and ecologically sound approach to limiting wild horse populations.

Solutions for long-term success

There are solutions for humane long-term management, that would effectively end inhumane roundups and stop the flow of tax-payer money to keeping mustangs in holding pens. They include:

Self-stabilizing herds - Putting up natural boundaries where needed and allowing natural predators such as mountain lions to reenter the restored ecosystems. This self-regulating model has worked with the Montgomery Pass herd where this herd has survived and maintained a stable population for 25 years without human management.

Fertility control - A contraceptive vaccine called PZP, which is approved by the Humane Society of the United States, has been used successfully with the wild horses of Maryland's Assateague Island. Administering it requires only remote darting of mares, which doesn't disrupt the social structure of the wild bands. It could save taxpayers as much as $7.7 million annually.

Ecotourism - Free-ranging mustangs are a draw for American and international tourists alike. Building non-disruptive sightseeing and tours to watch mustangs can bring income to the areas in which they roam and show they are more valuable alive than in holding pens or sent to slaughter.

Cooperation from ranchers - By working with ranchers who graze their livestock on public land, and requiring them to allow mustangs the same access to resources such as water as their livestock receive, BLM could reach a balance between protecting the herds on management land as the law requires and satisfying ranchers' needs.

Much of this information has been gathered from the American Wild Horse Campaign, a nonprofit organization that stays on top of the issue, keeping in touch and on the ground from Capitol Hill down to the ranges where mustangs are rounded up. It provides a good deal of information about the status of mustangs and what is, or rather, isn't being done to protect this iconic breed. It is a great resource for anyone interested in learning more.

Another excellent resource for learning exactly what is going on is the full report from the National Academy of Sciences, " Using Science to Improve the BLM Wild Horse and Burro Program." It is free to download and reveals from a scientific perspective where the BLM falls short of helping the very animals it is tasked to protect.

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Why the Mustangs of the West Are Disappearing

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Mustangs have been a part of the landscape of the United States for centuries.

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The Fight to Save America’s Wild Horses from Slaughter | The New Yorker

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BLM believes that "managing" horses is working an they have been doing it for 50 years.

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Celebrate 50 years of the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act

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Farley, Terri. Wild at Heart Mustangs and Young People Fighting to Save Them. Illustrated by Melissa Farlow, New York City, Houghton Mifflin Publishing Company,

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Cows are a huge factor of why horses are in danger.

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Wild horses rounded up by helicopter in program sparking controversy

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50 years on, here's how America's wild horses can be saved - Horsetalk.co.NZ

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This article is about is about why Wild Horses need to be saved

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On December 15, 1971, the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act was unanimously passed by Congress, and three days later, on December 18, it was given a glowing send-off by President Richard M Nixon during its signing ceremony. Wildlife ecologist Craig C Downer says the coming jubilee must see its rescue.
I believe that getting people to restore wild, naturally living horses and burros in America together with their viable habitats and at truly viable population levels is essential today if America is to pull out of its destructive vortex of selfish and greedy, materialistic speciesism.

Speciesism means only considering one's own species as important and to regard the rest as all being here merely as things, or objects, to be used and abused or gotten rid of according to people's selfish wants or whims.

This is no right and moral way and it is leading to the destruction of all life on earth. All life on earth is really one united family that has taken millions of years to establish itself on this planet. To destroy this for a relatively few years of materialistic indulgence is immoral beyond belief. It is a cardinal sin.

The Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971 that was passed 50 years ago should now be celebrating not lamenting what has happened with America's magnificent wild, naturally living horses and burros. But unless we change the present state of affairs, this noble and life-enhancing law shall have failed. We cannot allow this to happen. We can make a turnaround and restore the true intent of this good-willed act, but we ourselves must act if we are to save and restore the wild horses and burros, a healthy and balanced life community, and the human race itself.

This jubilee year must see the rescue of the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act.

This means restoring holistically complete habitats for all seasons of the year and that are appropriate for the long-term survival of truly long-term viable populations of interbreeding wild horses and burros who number in the thousands - not the outrageously low and non-viable levels that the BLM and US Forest Service have assigned for them in contradiction of the pure and core intent of the law.

We must break the "agency capture" of this program and get it into the hands of people who really understand, appreciate and care for the wild, naturally living horses and burros and their legal and adequate natural homes. And we must follow the sound principles of reserve design that treat horses and burros and their natural and legal habitats with the enlightened respect that they deserve.

Wild horse restoration is intrinsically important to the future of life on Earth. This has been their home for millions of years, and they have a universally important and indispensable role to play. This role can and must be restored, for it is a healing and restoring role that our planetary life community is in such desperate need of today.

All of my life, horses have been of foremost importance and I grew up riding and caring for a wonderful chestnut stallion named Poco. Together we discovered the mountains, forests, valleys and bushlands of Nevada and California, always keen for new adventures awaiting us just around the corner. Poco taught me so much and saved me and my family so often, because of his great wisdom and attunement to the world of nature.

One shining communication for me stands out. This is Poco's great longing to live the free and natural life again, in an unfenced and biodiverse place, and to be with his own kind. This became especially apparent when we encountered wild horses and were out riding amid the aromatic sagebrush and pinyon and juniper as well as Sierran ecosystems. Poco came so alive in these and was irrepressible in his desire to run up and greet his fellow wild horses - for every horse is truly wild at heart. Just being there and witnessing this was thrilling and spoke volumes to me.

The WFHBA mandates the just integration of the wild horses and burros into the public land ecosystem as the principal resource recipients and with management and interference at the "minimum feasible level" with their natural lifestyles and habitat (Section 3 (a) of WFHBA ).

Several other laws, including NEPA, Endangered Species Act, National Historical Preservation Act, FLPMA, PRIA, Administrative Policy Act and Multiple Use Act, should also uphold the rights of wild horses and burros throughout the West to viable populations in viable habitats.

The Horse Family, Equidae, is of North American origin as are the Horse Genus, Equus, and species, Equus caballus. The Burro's (Equus asinus) lineage is also deeply rooted in North America. The origin of the Horse Family traces back some 58 million years. (See MacFadden, B.J. 1992. Fossil Horses: Systematics, Paleobiology, and Evolution of the Family Equidae . Cambridge Univ. Press)

Wild, naturally living horses and burros complement North America's life community in many direct and obvious as well as more subtle ways. (See Chapter II of my book and this article )

Their cecal, post-gastric, digestive system enables them to eat coarser, drier vegetation and, through symbiotic microbial activity, to break down cellulose cell walls to derive sufficient nutrients from the inner cell without over-taxing their metabolism.

Equids' frequent consumption of more coarse, drier vegetation can greatly benefit sympatric, pre-gastric, ruminant herbivores as well as energize and enrich the ecosystem as a whole. (See: Facilitation between Bovids and Equids in an African Savanna and Bell, R.H.V. 1970. The use of the herb layer by grazing ungulates in the Serengeti. Animal Populations in Relation to Their Food Source. Brit. Ecol. Soc. Symp.)

The lesser decomposed vegetable matter in the droppings of horses, as compared with ruminants, more greatly builds the vital humus component of soils , which enriches these, making them more fertile and water-retentive and, thus, bolstering biodiversity and consequent resilience and stability in the ecosystem.

Wild horses and burros play a major role in mitigating and often even preventing major wildfires .

These equids act as Keystone species benefiting hundreds, even thousands of species of plants, animals, microorganisms, etc, with which they have co-evolved for centuries, thousands - even millions of years. They are prey and scavenged species that contribute to many important food chains, which include canids, felids, raptors and many other important ecosystem components.

Also, during colder seasons, they can open up iced over water holes or ice-crusted vegetation so that many weaker animals can continue to eat and drink. During hot weather, they can sniff-out water sources and dig down to them, even through hard and rocky soils, thus allowing critical access to water for myriad plants and animals. They are great mutualists who, with their powerful and energetic bodies, can open up thickets to allow other animals to move around in bushlands and access important food sources. They also wallow in places such as those with clay where their wallows create natural water catchments, benefiting many plants and animals.

Horses can help diminish the invasive Cheat Grass (Bromus tectorum) that has been brought on by extensive disturbance of soils. This they do by eating these plants before they have set seed and by disseminating many other less invasive and native bunch grasses among other forbs and shrubs. (cf. Berger, J. 1986. Wild Horses of the Great Basin ; Univ. of Chicago Press.)

The rounded blunt hooves of equids cut less deeply and sharply into moist meadow and streamside soils when compared with cloven-hoofed cattle, sheep, elk, deer and pigs (see the preliminary report Impact Of Wild Horses On Wilderness Landscape and Wildfire .

Wild horses disperse their grazing pressure over larger areas within their home ranges and, unless forced into it, do not tend to camp around water sources as do domestic cattle in particular. They practice a form of natural rest-rotation. They also forage in a patchy manner, leaving islands of palatable grass, forbs, etc., to set seed. This is an instinctive form of wise rest-rotation that has permitted them to survive for millions of years. (cf. MacFadden, B.J. 1992. Op. cit.)

Although the BLM claims there were 53.4 million acres of original acres for wild horses and burros on BLM lands, and at least several million more existed on USFS lands in the 11 Western states at the passage of the Act, BLM now plans to allow these wild equids on only 26.9 million acres. Research has revealed that about 88 million acres actually may have qualified for being legal habitats, as the wild equids were found there in 1971. Yet government agencies allow cattle and sheep to forage on about 300 million acres, which include nearly 100% of the wild horse and burro legal areas and where these agencies on average allocate some 85 to 90% of the forage for livestock. This is a direct violation of Section 2 (c) of the WFHBA, which states that the wild equid legal areas shall be "devoted principally to the welfare and benefit" of the wild horses and burros, not the public land ranchers, oil and gas drillers, big game hunters, miners, ORVers, etc. By sacrificing the general public's great interest in the wild horses and burros on this quality-of-life issue, they disobey the "Multiple Use" mandate of the Multiple Use Act, FLPMA, PRIA, Endangered Species Act, among others. See "American Herds ".

In spite of government efforts to conceal the gross inequity involved, "one hundred to one" more accurately describes the resource allocation of livestock and big game in relation to wild equids on the public lands. (See Animal Welfare Institute. 2007. Managing for Extinction: Shortcomings of the Bureau of Land Management's National Wild Horse and Burro Program .)

A major failure of legal duty by federal officials concerns wild equids' access to water in the West. Yet, when all the wild horse and burro Herd Areas (BLM) and Territories (USFS) were declared and their boundaries determined on the ground, these areas automatically acquired Implied Federal Water Rights for the wild horses and burros. The federal authorities have refused to exercise these rights of the wild horses and burros and ipso facto and ipso jure of the General Public. (See my book The Wild Horse Conspiracy , Ch. IV, Pp. 125-126, interview with retired BLM Wild Horse and Burro Specialist John Phillips.)

Two Codes of Federal Regulations (CFR): 4710.5, "Closure to Livestock Grazing" and 4710.6, "Removal of Unauthorized Livestock in or near areas occupied by wild horses and burros" could be, but almost never are, applied to allow viable populations of these wild equids. Also ignored is the legal mandate under 43 CFR 4700.0-6[b]: "... wild horses and burros shall be considered comparably with other resource values in the formulation of [Land Use Plans]".

Public lands domestic livestock produce only 2% to 3% of the meat in beef in the US, and about 4% of the mutton, though more wool, in US (Rogers, P. and J. La Fleur. 1999 (11/7). Cash Cows: Taxes support a Wild West holdover that enriches ranchers and degrades the land. San Jose Mercury News. CA)

According to the IUCN Species Survival Commission, Equid Specialist Group: "For captive populations, we recommend a minimum population size [N] of 500 individuals ... [but] for wild populations we recommend a minimum size of 2500 individuals." Yet, BLM and USFS are ignoring this crucial and knowledgeable recommendation from the world's greatest equid experts and do not even adhere to what seems to be their own standards of from 150 to 200 individuals. (Duncan, P. 1992. Zebras, Asses, and Horses: An Action Plan for the Conservation of Wild Equids . IUCN SSC Equid Specialist Group. Gland Switzerland. Page 5.)

Concerning one egregious example of how both the BLM and USFS treat wild horses and burros: in the 784,325-acre Spring Mountain Complex of several wild horse and burro legal HMAs (BLM) and Territories (USFS), the Las Vegas BLM and Toiyabe-Humboldt National Forest team plan to allow for only one individual wild horse per 7615 legal Joint Management Area (JMA) acres and for only one individual wild burro per 5299 legal JMA acres in their "Appropriate Management Level" (AML) assignments. (See my book, Ch. 3, pages 75- 77.) This is but one of many similar, outrageous provisions for our "national heritage species."

In 1859, there were an estimated two to three million wild horses on the plains, prairies, deserts and mountain ranges of the US, but by 1976, five years after the passage of the WFHBA, only about 60,000 remained (Pittman, J. 2008 (2/25). Funds for wild horse lands and care strained. Santa Cruz Sentinel, California.). Although 17,000 is the official figure given by BLM for wild horses on the public lands at the passage of the WFHBA in 1971, this is widely considered to be low by at least a factor of two (cf. Animal Welfare Institute, 2007, cit.).

Since the passage of the Burns Amendment to the WFHBA in December 2004, many thousands of wild horses have been shipped over the border from the US to Canada and Mexico, mostly for a cruel and terrorizing end to their lives. (Animal Welfare Institute, 2007. cit.) It is believed that the SAFE bill has a good chance of stopping this in the present 117th US Congress of 2021-2022. Please write and call your Senators and Congressmen : 202-224-3121.

America's wild horse and burro herds have either been reduced to non-viable population levels or totally eliminated in most of their ca. 349 original legal herd areas on BLM lands. (Animal Welfare Institute, 2007. cit.). And an even more outrageous situation exists on US Forest Service lands that should have viable wild horse and burro herds on viable habitats.

The smear campaign against the wild horses and burros in the wild and the ruthless infiltration and evisceration of government programs by their enemies count among the most dishonorable and unsupportable happenings today and in American history. What is termed "agency capture" has occurred in our nation's wild horse and burro program. (See White Paper - Wild Horse Freedom Federation and Stillman, D. 2008. Mustang: The Saga of the Wild Horse in the American West . Houghton Mifflin Co., Boston)

Of the 177 greatly reduced HMAs throughout the BLM West, a glaring 130, or 73%, have Appropriate Management Levels (AMLs) of less than 150 - many much less than 100 and even in the teens. According to BLM's own substandard standard of 150 for genetic viability, as of 2020, in California 19 out of 22 HMAs had non-viable AMLs; in Utah: 17 out of 21; in Idaho, 5 out of 6; in Montana: 1 out of 1 (6 of the original 7 Herd Areas had been zeroed out); and in Nevada 67 out of 90 of the scant remaining herds are similarly non-viable. (See Animal Welfare Institute, 2008. Response to Government Accountability Office's Report, "Bureau of Land Management: Effective Long-term Options Needed to Manage Unadoptable Wild Horses ").

The Congressional Research Service reported for FY 2005 that forage eaten on BLM lands by livestock summed to 6,835,458 Animal Unit Months (AUM) contrasting with wild horse and burro consumption of only 381,120 AUMs, or 5.6% that of livestock, about one-20th. On US Forest Service lands, livestock devoured 6.6 million AUMs of forage, much of this in vital headwaters, while wild horses and burros got by on a meager 32,292 AUMs, or 0.5% that allocated to livestock, or one 200th of the forage pie (Animal Welfare Institute, 2007. cit.). And the situation today, 2021, is even much worse due to the gross increase in livestock and livestock trespass on public lands during the Trump Administration and earlier ones. (See Eckhoff, V. 2020. Cattle vs. Wild Horses 2002-2018, All data BLM and this article about the damage caused by the livestock industry .)

In the Great Basin by moderately harvesting nutritious nuts from the Pinyon Pines, much more healthy food would result in much less damage to the natural world when compared with raising cattle and sheep in the Great Basin (Wheat, M. M. 1967. Survival Arts of the Primitive Paiutes . Univ. Nevada-Reno). And the same applies to the moderate harvesting of the nutritional Jojoba bush nuts in the more arid deserts of the Southwestern US. And many other examples exist. Yet, BLM is waging a destructive campaign to greatly reduce the Pinyon and Juniper forests of the West to make the West even more of a livestock pasture than it already is. (See the Wild Horse Freedom Federation's article BLM plan for fuel breaks in Great Basin to cost millions of dollars but will scar public lands and make wildfires worse .)

Less than 21% of the terrestrial globe still contains all of the large mammals (greater than 20kg in weight) it supported several centuries ago. And the lack of these large animals who play keystone roles in the ecosystems, including as vital seed dispersers and soil builders, has diminished their resilience, stability and vitality and made them much more vulnerable to catastrophic wildfires - now greatly increasing through Global Warming (Morrison et al. 2007. Persistence of Large Mammal Fauna as Indicators of Global Human Impacts. Journal of Mammalogy 88(6): 1363 - 1380).

The range of the wild horse (Equus caballus) ca. AD 1500 was 13.5 million square kilometers compared with the current range of only 3073 sq km for the Prezwalski wild horse alone, representing a loss of almost the entire distribution according to some who ignore the great majority of wild horses throughout the world (Morrison, cit.). However, ca. 40,000 square miles should be added though wild horses still remaining in the Western United States and other impressive acreages could be added for other areas around the world, including Australia. Nevertheless, there exists an enormous vacant niche for the naturally living horse and other equids as well as other Perissodactyls, including tapirs and rhinos, that would be very important to fill and help the living Earth heal now in its time of most dire crisis and "existential threat".

Since the horse has a long co-evolutionary history with many diverse plant and animal companion species in a variety of ecosystems and over an extensive range, its disappearance constitutes a major ecological setback. As a major climax, as well as keystone, species, the horse has helped characterize and assist many of the Earth's ecosystems and is considered to be an ideal species for restoring degraded ecosystems, not only in North America, its evolutionary cradle, but throughout the world (see Naundrup, P.J. and J.C. Svenning, 2015. A Geographical Assessment of the Global Scope for Rewilding with Wild-Living Horses Equus ferus .

The reestablishment of the horse and burro in the North American Great Basin, Great Plains and Prairies, as well as in many suitable western mountains and valleys can help to combat the noxious effects of global climate change by greatly balancing and enhancing the native ecosystems.

Wild horses and burros should be restored to their original Herd Areas (HAs) throughout the West, including about 70,000 who are now in government corrals and long-term holding pastures. The legality of their refuges is based upon where they were found in 1971; this should be interpreted as meaning year-round habitats. But these areas are today largely empty of wild equids: a fact that, on the face of it, evinces the gross injustice with which these marvelous animals have been treated.

So now I will convey some of the most important messages and lessons I have learned over a lifetime. These are irrefutable justifications for restoring the wild horses and burros in America and elsewhere. There are many others, but here is what I believe is most crucial to impress upon people today in order to stop the ongoing wipeout and restore these magnificent equines to our shared home of planet Earth.

The major points of Reserve Design

We must restore the wild horse and burro herds and their habitats through Reserve Design and Rewilding in order to allow for long-term genetically viable populations. This can be done in a way that permits these remarkable animals to integrate into their natural habitats and to be naturally self-stabilizing as far as their numbers, i.e. attain a truly "Thriving Natural Ecological Balance" as Section 3 (a) of the WFHBA requires in direct reference to thriving wild horses and burros, not every other exploitive interest before them, as is currently the case. See this article .

Letting the equids reoccupy their full legal Herd Areas (BLM) or Territories (USFS) wherever possible and in no case less than 75% of the original 1971 home range.

Where a reduction in equid occupation is necessary, there shall be a compensatory acquisition of wild equid habitat of equal or greater value.

We shall allow the horses and burros themselves and the world of nature to show us what works best for each given area and allow a natural equilibrium of species to establish itself, including natural predators such as puma, bobcat/lynx, coyote, wolf and bear. Also, all the other herbivores including ruminant deer, elk, pronghorn, bighorn as well as smaller species such as rodents and rabbits, birds and reptiles, would be allowed to realize their respective roles and niches along with a great diversity of plant species. Let these species show us how marvelous a life home, or ecosystem, can be.

Codes of Federal Regulations 4710.5 and 4710.6 shall be employed to reduce or curtail livestock grazing within legal BLM Herd Areas and US Forest Service Territories.

Mandate purchase at fair and just value of base properties and water rights in conflict with the sound establishment of viable wild horse and burro herds. At first, this can be on a voluntary basis. But if necessary for the survival of the herds, it can be mandated. Of crucial importance today, this would be in sync with the urgent necessity of having naturally living horses and burros occupying greater areas of land in their capacity as major Carbon sequesters . Again, this is related to their different digestive system , which also relates to their greater ability to disperse germinative seeds of a greater variety.

Where necessary, employ semi-permeable, artificial barriers in designing each wild horse/burro Herd Area or Territory as the true sanctuary the WFHBA intends. The Log-&-Pole, buckrail-type fences that are employed in Montana BLM's Pryor Mountain Wild Horse Range work quite well.

Employ Strieter-Lite light reflectors that prevent collisions of animals with automobiles wherever major roads or highways transit or border wild equid HAs or Territories. (Contact Strieter-Lite representative Julie Keller Keller0404@outlook.com, (775-830-7739).

Implement the construction of natural wild horse and wildlife overpasses where necessary.

Do not overly restrict the wild equids, as by fencing or other means, within their large, viably sized and complete habitats. Also, make it a policy to minimize or eliminate vehicle impacts, roads, off-road vehicles and impacts from mining, fracking, etc., within the wild equid areas.

Design and employ buffer zones around the wild equid HAs, HMAs, and Territories. Here a gradual tapering off of wild equid presence would occur through the implementation of discouragements to their transiting into areas where danger exists for them, such as in farms, towns or cities. This can involve "adverse conditioning" that is not overly harsh as well as "positive reinforcement". Remember: horses and burros are very intelligent animals who can learn where they are safe and can realize their basic needs for survival and a pleasant and fulfilling life.

Employ Sections 4 and 6 of the WFHBA to incorporate lands from other government agencies, including state, county and municipal, as well as private lands, into the HAs, HMAs and Territories. This would be in order for these to contain complete habitats for long-term-viable herds of wild horses and wild burros. In this regard, it is essential that wild horse-and-burro knowledgeable and caring biologists be employed to identify such long-term-viable habitats.

Mount a positive, public education campaign with people who live and work around and visit the wild equid habitats so that they will positively participate in the realization of truly long-term-viable wild equid herds and their adequate, commensurate sanctuary habitats. These people could become monitors and protectors of the herds and their habitats and derive benefits, as for example, from ecotourism and/or subsidies from the government. Here a positive attitude from whoever is given authority to protect and manage these animals, is essential if they are to be truly conserved in nature rather than tortured and persecuted while their legal habitats are overrun - as is currently the case. A new agency may well be required that is autonomous and free from long-ingrained anti-wild-horse-and-burro policies. This would require an Act of Congress. In my opinion, the sooner this is introduced, the better, if America is to have any remaining, unobliterated and truly viable herds and habitats.

Allow each wild equid herd to fulfill its ecological niche within each Herd Area and Territory. Allow each herd and the complex of species in its habitat to self-stabilize, or auto-regulate, its population. This is entirely consistent with the true nature of wild equids (see Rogovin, K.A. and M.P. Moshkin. 2007. Autoregulation in mammalian populations and stress: an old theme revisited . Zhurnal obschchei biologii. 68(4): 244-267 [In Russian].)

Both horses and burros are climax species and capable of self-limitation. They do not expand out of control to destroy their habitat and ultimately themselves, as humanity - now nearing 8 billion people (12/2021, US Census Bureau) - is presently doing. In the mature social units of wild horses known as bands, both the lead stallion, or patron, and the lead mare socially inhibit reproduction among younger members of their band, who are usually their offspring. (See Jenkins, S.H. and M.C. Ashley. 2003. "Wild Horse, Equus caballus, and Allies", Ch. 53 in Wild mammals of North America: Biology, Management and Conservation . 2nd Editors: G.A. Feldhamer, BC. Thompson and J.A. Chapman. John Hopkins Univ. Press. See pages 1148 to 1163.) [Jenkins was my major professor for my M.S. in Biology at UNR.] Wild naturally living burros also limit their populations through the formation of jack-defended territories.

The draconian, herd-gutting roundups, often by helicopter or bait or water-tapping, disrupt these mature social units and destroy this natural form of self-regulation. This is something BLM, USFS and profiteering roundup contractors are loath to admit.

When resources and habitat components, including forage, water, shelter, mineral sources, special seasonal habitats and even adequate space, become limiting, horses and burros naturally reduce their reproduction, true to their climax species nature (Rogovin and Moshkin 2007, cit.).

Follow the IUCN SSC Equid Specialist Group guidelines that specify 2500 individuals in order to achieve long-term viability for a wild equid population (Duncan 1992, p. 5, cit.).

Do not employ invasive castration or ovariectomies, IUDs, nor fertility control drugs such as PZP , GonaCon, etc. These torture and debilitate, genetically alter, cause out-of-season, deformed and still-born births - and often kill - the wild horses and burros. These thoughtless and inhumane procedures undermine the horses' and burros' fitness to survive, weaken their immune systems over the generations, cause social disruption and are forms of domestication that are entirely antithetical to the true and core purpose and intent of the WFHBA. Reserve Design is the solution, not this cruel and disrespectful kind of treatment of the wild equids that places them at the very bottom position of priorities within their very own legal areas - where they are supposed to be on top. (See this article and this fact sheet from Protect Mustangs .)

Work to have America's wild horses and wild burros declared as UNESCO World Heritage, as well as in the United States, National Heritage species. Wild horses combine Spanish, Andalusian, Sorraia, Berber, Arab and various, especially northern European, races - even "Curly Horses ". The hardy wild horses and burros have much the same diversity and hybrid vigor as we Americans ourselves.

This can be achieved by:

Remember: In the wild, in the natural biodiverse world that has established itself over the course of millions of years, the true vigor of the species - and the life community we all share - is preserved.

Craig C. Downer is a wildlife ecologist who has specialized in the Mammalian Order Perissodactyla. This order includes the Horse Family, Equidae, as well as the Families Tapiridae and Rhinocerontidae. While earning his M.S. at the University of Nevada-Reno, he did a field study and paper on the Pine Nut Mountain wild horses. Later in his career he did a professional herd and habitat analysis of these unique wild horses, that have a strong Spanish Colonial component. Craig worked with Wild Horse Annie (Velma Bronn Johnston) in the 1970s when the Wild Free-roaming Horses and Burros Act (WFHBA) was first being implemented. He has written books and articles and given speeches and presentations and guided films about wild horses.

As a legal plaintiff in numerous court cases, he has defended the rights of the wild horses and burros throughout America after having investigated their unfair treatment on the public lands throughout the West. His Reserve Design project for restoring the herds and their habitats to viable levels has registered with many people and government agencies and is producing a much-needed turnaround for these magnificent and benign animals. His organization the Andean Tapir Fund / Wild Horse and Burro Fund has awakened many people concerning the many positive contributions these species make to ecosystems as well as concerning their North American origins and long-standing evolution. His dynamic, greater truth- and justice-serving organization upholds the pure intent of the WFHBA. Its website contains his reports, articles, videos and interviews and those of others and provides an important overview on this subject as well as a well-informed and timely call to action. Contact Craig at ccdowner@aol.com (775) 901-2094; PO Box 456, Minden, NV 89423-0456 USA.

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50 years on, here's how America's wild horses can be saved - Horsetalk.co.nz

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On December 15, 1971, the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act was unanimously passed by Congress, and three days later, on December 18, it was given a glowing send-off by President Richard M Nixon during its signing ceremony . Wildlife ecologist Craig C Downer says the coming jubilee must see its rescue.

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Wild Horse podcast- lets you know what's happening.