Sheryl Crow Joins United Effort in Calling for Moratorium

Thank you to Sheryl Crow, Ed Harris, Wendie Malick and over 130 Organizations who have signed on to a unified letter calling for an immediate moratorium on roundups!

From Politico.com, 11-20-09 article

Full press release here: 11-20-09 Press Release

Study: Grazing threatens U.S. wildlife habitat- AP article

By Scott Sonner, Associated Press – Article here

BLM Will Treat 3,000 Wild Mares with Fertility Drug After Decimating Herds by Capture

BLM Will Treat 3,000 Wild Mares with Fertility Drug After Decimating Herds by Capture

By Steven Long

HOUSTON, (Horseback) – The year 2010 will mark an enormous turning point in the history of America’s wild horses and burros as their caretaker, the federal Bureau of Land Management, launches an aggressive campaign to remove them from their wilderness homes.

continued online at www.horsebackmagazine.com

Wild Horses on Big Blend Radio- Friday

Join Ginger Kathrens, Valerie Stanley, esq., Craig Downer on Big Blend Magazine Radio editors Lisa and Nancy and Animal Communicator Laura Lassiter on Friday, Nov. 20 from 4-7pm PT / 5-8pm MT.

The Wild Horse Segment runs from 6-7pm PST / 7-8pm MST  Please see what’s featured in their newsletter site

Listen here

Roundup Schedule 2009-2010

Click Here to Download Roundup schedule 2009-2010– Encourage Reporters and Media to go and witness a roundup.

Contact BLM for more information on locations:

Don Glenn- Chief, Wild Horse and Burro Program, Washington D.C. 202-452- 5082 don_glenn@blm.gov

Tom Gorey, Senior Public Affairs Specialist
- BLM Public Affairs, Washington, D.C. 202-452-5137 Tom_Gorey@blm.gov

For a list of national media contacts: click here

Unified Letter to President Obama and Secretary Salazar Requesting Immediate Moratorium on Roundups

Download the Moratorium letter here and click here for the list of over 120 organizations, celebrities, scientists and authors in support. Organizations are still encouraged and welcome to sign, just e-mail us to be added. We’d like even more celebrity and scientific support too. Some organizations must meet with their boards before signing on so we expect this list to grow. A press release from the Cloud Foundation announcing this unified letter is available here: Unified Call for Moratorium Press Release. Please share the press release with your favorite media sources and ask that this story be covered and what is happening to our wild horses and burros investigated. A media list is available here: National Media Contacts. Share the letter and your polite request for more pressure from Congress with your Representatives (click here to contact).

This was a collective effort among many and we thank everyone for their support. This is not a Cloud Foundation letter but a unified call from many for our wild horses and burros.

A Unified Call for an Immediate Moratorium on Wild Horse & Burro Roundups

And a humane, fiscally responsible plan for preserving and protecting the iconic,

free-roaming wild horses and burros of the American West

President Obama, Members of Congress and the Department of the Interior:

We, the undersigned, request major changes to the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) Wild Horse and Burro program. This must begin with an immediate moratorium on all roundups. While we agree that the program is in dire need of reform, and we applaud your Administration’s commitment to avoid BLM’s suggested mass-killing of horses, the plan outlined in October by Interior Secretary Ken Salazar raises numerous concerns. These include:

• Perpetuating the flawed assumption that wild horses and burros are overpopulating their Western ranges. In reality, the BLM has no accurate current inventory of the 37,000 wild horses and burros it claims remain on public lands. Independent analysis of BLM’s own numbers reveal there may be only 15,000 wild horses remaining on public lands.

• Continuing the mass removal of wild horses and burros from their rightful Western ranges: The BLM intends to spend over $30 million in Fiscal Year 2010 to capture more than 12,000 wild horses and burros. This stockpiling of horses continues even as an astounding 32,000 are already being held in government holding facilities at enormous taxpayer expense.

• Scapegoating wild horses and burros for range deterioration even though they comprise only a tiny fraction of animals and wildlife grazing our public lands. Far greater damage is caused by privately-owned livestock, which outnumber the horses more than 100 to 1.

• Moving wild horses and burros east off their Western homelands to “sanctuaries” in the east and Midwest at an initial cost of $96 million creates significant health concerns if animals adapted to western landscapes are managed on wet ground and rich grasses.

Removing tens of thousands of horses and burros from their legally-designated Western ranges and moving them into government-run facilities subverts the intent of the 1971 Wild Free-roaming Horse and Burro Act, which mandated that horses be preserved “where presently found.” A 2009 DC district court case held that “Congress did not authorize BLM to “manage” the wild horses and burros by corralling them for private maintenance or long-term care as non-wild free-roaming animals off the public lands.”

We appreciate your Administration’s recognition of the horses’ value as an ecotourism resource. However, the display of captive, non-reproducing herds in eastern pastures renders them little more than zoo exhibits, further discounting the contribution to our history and the future of the American West.

We believe that workable solutions to create a healthy “multiple use” of public rangelands, protect the ecological balance of all wildlife, and preserve America’s wild horses and burros in their rightful, legally protected home can be achieved. We are calling on the Obama Administration to reform the BLM’s Wild Horse and Burro Management Program.

We ask that you reverse the current course and immediately take the following actions:

1)    Place a moratorium on all roundups until accurate and independent assessments of population numbers and range conditions are made available and a final, long-term solution is formalized.

2)    Restore protections included in the 1971 Wild Free-Roaming Horse and Burro Act. Update existing laws that protect wild horses by reopening certain public lands to the mustangs and burros, thus decreasing the number in captivity. Return healthy wild horses and burros in holding to all available acres of public land designated primarily for their use in 1971. If these lands are not available, equivalent and appropriate western public lands should be added in their place.

3)    Support federal grazing permit buybacks. Reduce livestock grazing and reanalyze appropriate management levels for herd management areas to allow for self-sustaining, genetically-viable herds to exist in the west.

4)    Conduct Congressional hearings regarding the mismanagement of our wild herds and further investigate the inability of BLM to correct the shortcomings of the program as audited by the Government Accountability Office’s 1990, 1991 and 2008 reports.

Supported by the undersigned on November 18, 2009

Howling Ridge Radio- Wild Horses on Wednesday

This is a don’t miss program for our wild ones! We have Ginger Kathrens and Makendra Silverman (The Cloud Foundation), Laura Leigh, Craig Downer and Laura Allen (Animal Law Coalition). We will be discussing some exciting news that has been occurring over the last few days, as well as the upcoming Calico Complex round-up, a discussion on ROAM (Laura Allen) and John Holland’s article with AP. With all the activity we’ve been having, we are going to give you all the updates/information and then open the lines for calls.  You can also submit questions via the chat function that Elle monitors throughout the program.

9:30p Eastern, Wednesday Nov 18

Listen here: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/Howling_Ridge_Radio

On-Air Calls: 718.664.6596 (if you want to ask a question on the air, press 1 so we get the signal, otherwise, we will assume you are just listening via phone)

Assault Planned on Last Wild Horse Stronghold

New message from Ginger here

Despite a significant public outcry, BLM plans a helicopter round up to remove thousands of wild horses in northwestern Nevada, an area called the Calico Complex in a remote and starkly beautiful landscape of volcanic outcrops, steep canyons and wide valleys. It is home to over 3,000 wild horses and represents the last stronghold of the once large herds of American mustangs that roamed the west by the millions.

The attack on Calico is scheduled to begin in December and continue through the dead of winter…. (continues here)  *please note correction that  total herd complex area is 542,100 acres, not 1.5 million- our apologies for this inaccuracy.

Living Images by Carol Walker

A Bloodless Genocide?

New Article from HorseTalk in New Zealand, read here.

Calico Comment Period Extended- please comment!

Over 7,000 comments have been received to date on the massive removal planned for this winter in the NW Nevada Calico herd complex– you can comment here via webform on the In Defense of Animals website site — still the BLM is not listening. Please comment before November 22nd. Thank you

Article from Examiner.com : “Wild Horse Removal Generates Over 7000 Comments to BLM”