[TimmysMom]

This is a letter I just recieved from a friend who has a Kiger Mustang:

Things are getting desperate with the Pryor Mountain mustang herd. They plan on capturing almost half of the herd this summer. This will ultimately mean the destruction of the herd. The people trying to help these horses are even trying to get Oprah's attention now, in a last chance effort to stop this from happening.
Here is a letter that I wrote to Oprah. The contact information for her show is in the news letter below. I urge you all to please take a few minutes and write a letter of your own.

(name withheld)



Dear Oprah,
I am writing to implore you to do a show to raise awareness about what is happening to the wild mustangs of the United States. The BLM has mismanaged these animals for so long that they are in desperate need of our help. There is a plan to remove almost half of the Pryor Mountain herd of Mustangs in Montana this summer, which will leave the herd genetically nonviable, and to administer a still experimental contraceptive drug to the rest of the mares that are captured and released. This will almost guarantee the inbreeding and eventual extinction of this precious herd of wild mustangs. The same plan is in place for many other herds throughout the United States. It appears that the BLM has a plan to eliminate all herds of wild horses left in this country. The BLM has proposed euthanasia for all of the 30,000+ Mustangs that are currently being held in BLM holding pens. The really sad thing about this is that they never needed to be taken into captivity in the first place. There is still plenty of range land available for these horses if they are just allowed access to it. Instead we seem to be of forcing a great part of our country's heritage into extinction.

The San Diego zoo just placed a wild mustang on exhibit in their zoo. I fear that this does not bode well for the future of our countries wild horses.

I know you are an animal lover and hope that you can see what a great tragedy the loss of the wild mustang would be.

Sincerely,

here is the organization:

[pest 357]

I just found your post if you have not listened to Howling Ridge Radio they just had Ginger on and she gave a wonderful talk about Cloud and his herd.There are a lot of people involved in a very active campagin to stop the BLM rounding up all or part of Cloud's herd I pray for once the BLM listens!

[lbhugg]

Why are they capturing herds if they are trying to limit production can't we capture geld and release why do we always have to **** w/nature

[pest 357]

ibhugg, that is the question of the century!???

[CJnBucksMom]

Has the BLM stated any kind of reasoning for this?

[mftx4]

What ever happened to Mrs. T. Boone Pickens. Wasn't she supposed to buy up like 100,000 acers to turn wild horses free on?
Some of those mustangs have languished in those holding pens for years. Foals are born there with no regard. The enitial idea was proably a good one, but over the years it has become a travesty.

[Fallon]

Originally Posted by lbhugg

Why are they capturing herds if they are trying to limit production can't we capture geld and release why do we always have to **** w/nature

Gelding and releasing causes huge problems within the herd structures. It's a nice idea but not practical at all. The expense, the care needed for gelding (try doing that for a wild horse), and then the herd social ramifications of having geldings who won't fight off a stud running loose in the herds etc... Not good.

Originally Posted by mftx4

What ever happened to Mrs. T. Boone Pickens. Wasn't she supposed to buy up like 100,000 acers to turn wild horses free on?
Some of those mustangs have languished in those holding pens for years. Foals are born there with no regard. The enitial idea was proably a good one, but over the years it has become a travesty.

First off the horses do not 'languish' in holding pens for years. The holding pens are temporary. The horses go from the range to a holding facility then the horses there go from adoption event to adoption event until they are either adopted or have been passed over 3 times. If they become 3 strikers they are then sent onto the long term holding facilities (which are maintained and are usually thousands of acres big).

Foals are NOT born in either the holding facilities or the long term holding without reguard. In both places the horses are seperated by sex. No breeding goes on at either type of facility. Sure mares do foal at both. After all it takes about a year for a mare to carry a foal to term and in that time she can be passed over at 3 adoptions and go onto a long term facility.

If she foals at a long term facility, the foals are seperated out every fall (weaning time) and the 'girl foals' released back with the mares, and the 'boy foals' are released into the male herds.

Or she can foal out at a holding facility in which case she's offered up for adoption as a mare/foal pair or offered up for adoption after the foal is weaned (and then the foal is subsiquently offered as well). Once foals reach weaning age they are seperated into which ever sex herd they happen to be.

Please get your information straight before you talk about stuff like this.

As for Cloud and his herd... If there hadn't of been a documentary about him, there would be NO FUSS about his herd being rounded up. I see no fuss raised when the Kiger HMA is rounded up, or the Warm Springs, or Coyote Butte, of Beatty Butte, etc. Cloud and his herd are no more special, don't deserve any special consideration or treatment, than any other herd of mustangs out there.

The BLM is required by law to watch the herds, round up the horses to control the numbers of them in any one area, and to round up any horses that aren't in good health or who don't have enough forage to adequately survive. They are also required by law to round up any horses that continueally leave the HMA boundaries. This happens to be what Cloud's herd routinely does - they even show it in the documentary.

Don't sit here and whine about what is happening to ONE horse herd when it's happening to all the herds and those herds are just as deserving as Clouds.

If you don't like the laws, change them. If you don't like how the BLM does things, volunteer with them and work to change those things. Find a solution, don't whine about what happens, work to fix the problem instead.

Round ups are a must for the health of these horses. Once rounded up and brought to the holding facilities most loose their fear of people, to release them again into the wild causes a threat to the safety of the people they may then come across. It can also cause a threat to the safety of the horse itself.

You may not like that this happens, but it is necessary. You may not like that there are long term holding facilities for horses that aren't adopted where the horses get routinely fed and watered at all times and are allowed to run free in same sex herds for the rest of thier lives, but it is necessary. You may not like how the BLM handles 70,000+ horses, but I don't see anyone else able to do it for them.

Research before you start talking about this subject. The debate on roundups has been going on for years and years and to date, there is NO solution.

If you think you can come up with one that will allow all the horses to run free, still be well fed, breed willy nilly, never get into neighborhoods or on major interstates (think about the pile up hitting a horse at 60 mph can cause), where they never mix in with domestic stock, they never run out of feed and water, then by all means suggest it.

Until then, go adopt a horse to keep it out of those long term facilities that you don't like. They are better than starving to death, IMO.

[mftx4]

You and I will never 'fix' all of the horse problems in this country. I lived in Texas for a year and saw some of the attrosities that used to happen in those holding pens, thank you.
I'm working on projects right here to try to help horses in my own area. We can't all be in the same place to fight just one battle when there are many skirmishes to win first. We all choose our commitments and I've chosen to work on the home front.
Every step each of us takes to try to help these animals, wild or domestic, is a step toward the future of all of them.

[Fallon]

Originally Posted by mftx4

You and I will never 'fix' all of the horse problems in this country. I lived in Texas for a year and saw some of the attrosities that used to happen in those holding pens, thank you.
I'm working on projects right here to try to help horses in my own area. We can't all be in the same place to fight just one battle when there are many skirmishes to win first. We all choose our commitments and I've chosen to work on the home front.
Every step each of us takes to try to help these animals, wild or domestic, is a step toward the future of all of them.

Holding pens or long term facilities? There is a huge difference.

Holding pens can often times be a pretty hectic wild place. Those fresh of the range horses tend to take some time before they're content not to challenge/jump fences and each other when herds are newly mixed. It can seem very awful to people who are not familiar with wild horse behavior. For example, throwing 10 newly caught herd sires in a pen together to seperate them from the mares can cause a melee, those horses are used to fighting each other, not living together. They do eventually calm down, but in the meantime it must be done to prevent further breeding.

Put 10 alpha herd mares together and look out...

No place is perfect and to say that something happened in one place so it must happen at all of them is wrong. The BLM can't be everywhere at all times either.

So, are you helping mustangs?

No we can't 'fix' everything, but most people just sit and whine instead of acting and those people don't have the right to whine IMO, if they're not willing to go out and at least attempt to do something about it.

To pick one herd to fight for over all others simply because one filmmaker wrangled permission to go and film there, is simply not right. Every horse deserves a chance whether they've been filmed or not.

I like Cloud, but the reality is, his herd is in danger of starving to death. I'd rather he go to a long term facility to live his live out well fed (he's very old, he probably doesn't have all that many years left anyway). It's simply not right to say that it's not fair that this herd gets rounded up, but go for it with all other herds.

Management under the LAW is management and that includes all HMA's.

[lbhugg]

[quote=Fallon;3916450]Gelding and releasing causes huge problems within the herd structures. It's a nice idea but not practical at all. The expense, the care needed for gelding (try doing that for a wild horse), and then the herd social ramifications of having geldings who won't fight off a stud running loose in the herds etc... Not good.



I guess i don't see it by gelding some of them they are basically lower on the totem pole because at that point they don't have a hard drive to fight aka another stallion is lead. I am not saying to geld them all. As far as cost and care I don't know what your vet charge out there or anything but I sure would think it is cheaper than housing feeding all those horses. Again I don't know how you run things that way but when a geld is done around here it isn't really any care turn them out and go they want them exersized but nothing gets put on them.