Wild horse round-up begins in southwest Idaho
2007, Associated Press
July 26 - The Bureau of Land Management has started rounding up wild horses in southwestern Idaho to reduce herd numbers so the horses don't overgraze rangelands. Yesterday BLM crews used a helicopter and a Judas horse trained to run into a trap to capture 41 horses. Officials say they will be done rounding up horses by August 3rd and hope to capture 296 horses in all.

Still No Answer From Nevada BLM on Wild Horse Budget Spending
2007, Las Vegas Now
July 18 - Nevada's Bureau of Land Management is rounding up more wild horses than ever before. Thousands of horses have been removed from the ranges in the last two years. In fact, there are now more wild horses in government pens than there are in the wild. So what does it cost to mount all of these roundups? Apparently, the BLM doesn't know.

BLM offers discounts on wild horses
2007, Associated Press
Jackson, WY, July 13 - The Bureau of Land Management in Wyoming is offering discount prices on captured wild horses. Between now and the end of September, mares and foals can be adopted for $125 per pair. Standard adoption fees are $125 per animal.

BLM seeks bid for more pasture facilities to maintain wild horses
2007, Associated Press
June 25 - The Bureau of Land Management is asking for bids for new pastures to hold its wild horses and burros. The bureau has pastures in Oklahoma and Kansas but is now looking to expand. Each pasture facility must be able to provide humane care for and maintain at least 1,000 wild horses -- up to as many as 2,500 over a 1-year period.

Final Round-Up of Nevada's Wild Horses
2007, KLAS-TV
May 25, Las Vegas, NV - Tough times lie ahead for Nevada's wild horses. There are already more horses in government pens than exist on the open range. Wild horse advocates suspect that the drastic horse roundups Nevada has seen in recent months are related to the news that the BLM budget is being cut, as if someone was trying to grab as many horses as they could while the money was still there.

House Votes To End Wild Horse Slaughter
2007, Associated Press
April 26, Washington, D.C. - The House voted Thursday to prevent the government from selling off for slaughter any wild horses and burros that roam public lands in the West. The 277-137 vote would restore a 1971 law preventing the Bureau of Land Management from selling the animals for commercial processing. The protection was removed in 2004 when former Sen. Conrad Burns, R-Mont., inserted a measure in a spending bill allowing their sale. "These animals were earmarked for death," said the bill's sponsor, Democratic Rep. Nick Rahall of West Virginia, chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee.

History-making wild horse settlement
2007, Arizona Central
A "significant victory" for horse lovers, that's how the attorney representing a coalition of animal advocates is characterizing an agreement reached with the US Forest Service. The group is dropping a lawsuit filed to protect a herd of nearly 400 horses roaming the Apache-Sitgreaves National Forest near Heber. In exchange, the Forest Service will solicit public comment on how the wild horses living on the forest should be managed. The Forest Service must also recognize: wild horses as "an integral part of the system of public lands".

Panel approves wild horse sale ban
2007, Star-Tribune
March 10 - Legislation to reinstate a ban on the commercial sale and slaughter of wild horses and burros was approved by the U.S. House Natural Resources Committee this week. The bill, which has received bipartisan support, would restore the prohibition on the sale and slaughter of wild horses and burros that was eliminated by [the Burns Amendment]. To the delight of Western stockmen and the consternation of wild horse advocates, Burns' amendment allowed the sale of any wild horse that has been rounded up and is more than 10 years old or has been unsuccessful in the adoption program three times. Stockmen have voiced concerns that wild horses compete with cattle for limited forage in the dry West, while wild horse advocates have downplayed the competition, noting that wild horses number only 28,000 in a West that has 9 million cattle grazing on public lands.

Wanted: Albertans to save 10 American wild horses
2007, Edmonton Journal
Edmonton, March 6 - Ten American mustangs have been on a wild ride in the last few months -- from the northern Nevada desert to [humane enforcement] seizure in Alberta to the auction block, and possibly the slaughterhouse. But now there's hope that the incredible journey will end instead in adoption of the animals by foster farms. The horses, part of a group culled by officials from the Sheldon National Wildlife Refuge in Nevada, were brought to Alberta by an Evansburg-area woman, who planned to sell them.

Advocates Will Fight On For Nevada's Wild Horses
2007, Las Vegas Now
A federal court judge refused to stop the round ups of wild horses and burros that roam government land in Southern Nevada. The Bureau of Land Management says the animals need to be removed because there is not enough food for them, but advocates accuse the BLM of mismanaging the horses. The attorney for the group says, "Anyone who has spent time in the desert sees guzzlers for quail. They see guzzlers for big horn sheep." He adds the government does not want the hassle of actually managing the herds: "I think it is labor intensive. I think it's controversial and it's best and easiest to take them off the land."

Santa Maria Ranch developers seek solution to wild horse removal dilemma
2007, Reno-Gazette Journal
Key people working to find a way to have wild horses and people peacefully coexist in the housing subdivision that lies on land that was once the Santa Maria Ranch gathered Friday to discuss several fencing options. A saga that has played out for almost six months pitting wild horse lovers and developers of the Santa Maria Ranch against one another may have an amicable solution. Developers stood in the chill of the early morning air to discuss the wild horses that obviously think the ranch is part of their roaming territory. The meeting was a continuance of the December 11 Emergency Community Forum that was attended by more than 125 people, mostly outraged over the gradual loss of wildlife, particularly wild horses throughout the region.

Texas Horse Slaughterhouses Violate Law, Appeals Court Decides
2007, Bloomberg
Jan. 20 - Two Texas slaughterhouses responsible for half the 100,000 horses killed in the U.S. annually for overseas consumption may face criminal charges if they don't shut down, the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decided. ``The lone cowboy riding his horse on a Texas trail is a cinematic icon,'' the three-judge appellate decision said in a unanimous decision yesterday. ``Not once in memory did the cowboy eat his horse, but film is an imperfect mirror.''

BLM officials back wild horse ranch
2007, Casper Star Tribune
Concerns about the condition of wild horses moved to a private ranch in Albany County won't deter the Bureau of Land Management from pursuing more such arrangements, a state BLM official says. But a wild horse advocate said such "sanctuaries" aren't the answer to dealing with what federal officials see as overpopulated horse herds in Wyoming and elsewhere the West.

Wild Horse Adoption Program Criticized
2007, KLAS-TV
Hundreds of wild horses and burros were rounded up in southern Nevada recently. BLM officials claim most of the animals will eventually be adopted out to good homes, but those claims are not supported by BLM's track record. Some of the horses and burros that were rounded up last week will eventually be adopted out but it's wishful thinking to say most will find homes. The fact is, most of the horses gathered from Nevada end up spending years in government pens.

Grazers seek no loss to energy
2007, Casper Star Tribune
Rawlins, WY, Jan. 13 - The Wyoming Stock Growers and Wyoming Wool Growers associations are asking that ranchers who lose grazing areas to energy development be compensated and that the grazing areas be reclaimed properly. The BLM is proposing to allow drilling of 2,000 natural gas wells on some 270,000 acres of federal, state and private land south of Rawlins. The BLM's study of the development says roads, facilities, damage to forage and weed invasion could result in the loss of 20,000 animal unit months over the life of the project. Ranchers can be compensated for loss of grazing leases by being allowed to graze their livestock elsewhere or by financial agreement.

BLM seeks bids for one or more new pasture facilities in West
2007, Reno Gazette Journal
As part of its responsibility to manage, protect and control wild horses and burros, the Bureau of Land Management is soliciting bids for one or more new pasture facilities located west of the Mississippi River. Each pasture facility must be able to provide humane care for and maintain at least 750 wild horses -- up to as many as 1,500 -- over a one-year period, with an option under BLM contract for an additional four one-year extensions. The BLM needs additional space for wild horses placed in long-term holding facilities, all of which are currently located in Kansas and Oklahoma.

Boy unearths important horse fossils
2007, Horse Talk
Jan. 12 - A startling discovery by a young Californian boy has helped fill a key gap in the evolution of the horse. Gavin Sutter, aged eight, from Auburn, found the prehistoric bones of a horse dating back 15 million years. "Fifteen million years ago, when these animals roamed Nevada, the Sierra Nevada and many of the mountains along the west coast of North America had not risen to their current elevation,"

Scientists tracking mountain lion to find out impact on wild horses
2007, Reno-Gazette Journal
Jan. 8 - Movements of a mountain lion that may be making a staple diet out of wild horses are being tracked by scientists at University of Nevada, Reno. The current study is an offshoot of previous research started in 2005 for the Nevada Department of Agriculture. That work, part of the state's effort to control and stabilize the wild horse population in the Virginia Range, attempted to determine how wild horse behavior is altered when mares are injected with contraceptive chemicals. While doing field work associated with that research, UNR graduate student Meeghan Gray kept coming across the remains of dead horses, generally foals or young adults with trauma to the neck or chest that were partially covered in dirt. "It was pretty obvious a mountain lion was doing this," Gray said.

Wild horse roundup begins
2007, Casper Star Tribune
Green River, WY, Jan. 6 -- Federal land managers began a massive winter roundup Friday to reduce two overpopulated wild horse herds that roam southwest Wyoming. The wild horses will be captured from the adjacent Adobe Town and Salt Wells herd management units, which, when combined, represent the biggest herd of wild horses in Wyoming. BLM state wild horse and burro program leader Alan Shepherd said the wild horse gathering aims to capture 1,760 wild horses from the two herds, whose population exceeds 2,000 animals. A horse advocacy group spokeswoman, however, called the winter roundup "ill-advised and potentially cruel" due to cold weather and treacherous footing. She said horses will likely get wet from running in the cold and could be susceptible to colds and other diseases.

Slaughter Bill Ban On Wild Horses Introduced Today
2007, The Horse
Washington, D.C., Jan. 5 – A bill to restore the 34-year ban on the commercial sale and slaughter of America's wild, free-roaming horses and burros (H.R. 249) was introduced today by U.S. House of Representatives Nick Rahall (D-W.Va.) and Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.). Similar legislation was passed unanimously last May as an amendment to the House Interior Appropriations bill, but stripped from the final bill in a House-Senate
conference committee.

Advocates to Challenge Wild Horse Roundup in Cold Creek
2006, Las Vegas Now
Las Vegas, NV, Dec. 22 - Government plans to round up hundreds of wild horses from the area around Cold Creek, Nevada are about to hit a snag. Wild horse advocates say they will go to court to stop the roundup. Herds of wild horses roam in and around Cold Creek almost daily, drawn by ample water in the area. Residents say the horses are healthy and well fed and are no threat to anyone. But the Bureau of Land Management says there are too many horses on the range and that there isn't enough food or water for them.

Wild horses kept at local feedlot
2006, Lahonta Valley News
December 22 - Jim Gianola, wild horse and burro specialist with the Bureau of Land Management, said 800 horses were hauled into the Fallon feedlot in the past six weeks, which serves as an overflow facility for the BLM's Palomino Valley Center. "There are more horses in holding facilities than outside in the wild," Gianola said.

Wild horses offered at reduced adoption rate
2006, The Pueblo Chieftain
Dec. 10, Canon City, NV - With 1,000 mouths to feed and more on the way, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management is looking to adopt out wild horses at the East Canon Prison Complex at a price even Santa would appreciate - $25. The reduced price, a savings of $100 per horse, is being offered on geldings aged 4 and older. The horses have not been trained.

Emergency Wild Horse Roundup Scheduled
2006, Associated Press
Dec. 3, Nev. - The U-S Bureau of Land Management has announced plans to conduct an emergency roundup of more than 200 wild horses from wildfire-ravaged areas of eastern Nevada. BLM officials say the roundup expected to start Sunday in portions of Lincoln and White Pine counties is necessary because of wildfires that destroyed forage for the animals. Officials plan to gather 190 wild horses from the Dry Lake, Highland Peak and Rattlesnake Herd Management Areas, and up to 25 wild horses from the Seaman and Clover HMAs. The roundup will leave about 160 wild horses in the latter HMAs and 80 horses in the other HMA's.

Controversial Wild Horse Roundup in Cold Creek, Nevada
2006, KLAS-TV
Las Vegas, NV, Nov. 17 - Another roundup of wild horses is in the works, this time in the community of Cold Creek, north of Las Vegas. A few hundred people live in Cold Creek. Many of them say they moved here because of the wild horses that wander through their property almost every evening. The locals know the horses so well they've given names to most of them. They've been hearing about a proposed roundup for months now, so Wednesday night, residents packed the fire station to find out what the BLM has in mind. They checked out the exhibits, ate the government cookies, and waited to speak their mind. The moment never came.

Galloping Scared
2006, Vanity Fair
Exhausted and terrified, a herd of wild mustangs gallop around the side of the mountain, miraculously managing to skirt the treacherous prairie-dog holes and deep crevices as they try to escape the screaming, whirling predator on their tail. Their instincts tell them they can out-run most any animal, but this one is relentless. You wish a director would yell "Cut," and the horses would be led to a plush Hollywood stable for rest, food, and water. But it's not a movie, and the pilot flying the helicopter is not an actor. He works for a government program to round up wild horses from public lands.

Nevada's Wild Horses: Soon Gone Forever?
2006, KLAS-TV
Las Vegas, NV - Nevada is home to more than half of all the wild horses in the nation, but the number of horses on the open range has plummeted in the past few years, mostly because of large-scale roundups by the Bureau of Land Management.

Wild Horses - Texas legend throws support behind move to protect herds.
2006, Texarkana Gazette
Aug. 25 - Texas legend Willie Nelson is probably best known for his songs, his raucous lifestyle, his battle with the IRS and his support for fellow Texas musician Kinky Friedman in the upcoming governor’s race. But Willie has another side to him. He has for many years been a big supporter of America’s farmers, organizing the Farm Aid concerts with Neil Young and John Mellencamp since 1985, and campaigning for increased use of biodiesel as an alternative fuel source. Now Willie is joining the crusade to save one of America’s last remaining ties to its Old West heritage—wild horses.

Nevada's Neglected Wild Horses
2006, KLAS-TV
The pictures are shocking, malnourished horses, feeding areas clogged with debris and wild animals neglected and left for dead. It's a bleak look at the life portrayed on federally owned and operated land. It has some speaking out about the care -- or lack thereof -- for these animals. Eyewitness News spent several hours on Friday with a group of wild horse advocates. They took us through some tough terrain to show us how these horses are being "managed." Take a short a drive from Las Vegas and you'll find the place, a beautiful desert area where wild horses once roamed the trails by the dozens. Now some believe they are being left to die out there.

Reining in the herd - BLM roundup plan draws critics
2006, Las Vegas Review-Journal
Las Vegas, NV, July 8 - The Bureau of Land Management plans to round up all but a few dozen wild horses from public lands on the outskirts of the Las Vegas Valley. Preservationists with the group Wild Horses 4 Ever called the Bureau of Land Management plan an attempt to "zero out" hundreds of horses in herds on six management areas in the Spring Mountains and west of Lake Mead. They said they are bewildered that the BLM can afford $350,000 to round up 250 wild horses and 570 burros from the Spring Mountains, plus 60 animals from areas near Lake Mead, but can't pay to repair water supplies where one of the 13 remaining wild horses in the Red Rock herd area was found dead recently.

The unkindest cuts
2006, Las Vegas City Life
July 6 - Unlike the Bureau of Land Management, which is bound by law to manage horses on its lands, U.S. Fish & Wildlife is charged with keeping things comfortable for native species -- in the case of Sheldon, a half-million-plus-acre refuge at the northwest border of Nevada, that includes the sage grouse, pronghorn antelope, mule deer, bighorn sheep and other animals. No spirited symbol of freedom on the list here; horses are deemed invaders. The June 19-20 roundup of about 330 horses was part of a broader plan. After officials rid the area of destructive cattle in the '90s, it was now the horses' turn to go -- not completely, but almost. In a bow to the public's appetite for oohing and ahhing at wild horses, officials set a goal of keeping about 100 horses on the range. But what was supposed to have been just a routine culling sparked a stampede of outrage -- and accusations of carelessness, callousness and cover-ups. Wild-horse activists say that in their zeal to curb the number of horses on Sheldon, federal officials ignored pleas to postpone the removal and needlessly ran to death several colts and foals. Further, they claim that the department's scheme for mass adoptions will surely send some horses to the slaughterhouse.

BLM hopes birth control will limit wild-horse population
2006, Associated Press
July 6 - The Bureau of Land Management plans to give 24 older wild horses birth control shots as part of an ongoing effort to help limit the population and address concerns about range conditions in the Pryor Mountains of Montana and Wyoming. The agency, which has used birth control in select mares since 2001, also plans for the first time to use mineral or protein blocks as bait to trap and capture up to 22 horses that would be put up for adoption later this summer. Half those horses are to be bachelor stallions and the other half yearlings.

Low turnout for annual wild horse, burro adoption
2006, Southeast Missourian
June 26, Jackson, MO – At the seventh Adopt-A-Wild Horse and Burro program, 70 horses and 11 burros were available for adoption, but only about 16 animals were adopted. Randy Anderson, head organizer of the event, was disappointed with the low turnout. "There's a lot of animals out there, less people to adopt them, a lot of competition from other organizations, the price of fuel and economic considerations." Larry and Robbie Lott of St. Louis adopted two mares at the event to put on their farm in Marble Hill, Mo. Larry said these horses require time and monetary commitments. "I wouldn't suggest a novice buying one of these horses," he said. "You need a place to put them. These are wild mustangs. You have to put the time in." Some people attending the event weren't interested in buying an equine, but were there to view the wild horses up close. Todd and Amy Buffington of Cape Girardeau brought their 2-year-old son.

Opponents of wild horse roundup fear slaughter is in store
2006, Reno Gazette-Journal
Jun 25 - With one critic calling the operation a "disaster," opponents of last week's wild horse roundup in northwest Nevada claim the captured mustangs will be shipped for slaughter instead of rescued for adoption. About 300 wild horses are corralled at the Sheldon National Wildlife Refuge on the Nevada-Oregon border. The roundup that ended Tuesday is part of a plan to remove all but about 100 of the estimated 1,500 mustangs living on the 575,000-acre range. "The BLM has a mandate to manage wild horses," said Neda DeMayo, who operates a horse sanctuary in Southern California. "Fish and wildlife doesn't. So, the only thing that would protect these horses is public outcry."

Humans wiped out wild horses, study suggest
2006, MSNBC
Horses originated in North America, but all the wild ones were killed by early hunters, researchers say. Some horses snuck over to Asia before the land/ice bridge disappeared. Those were domesticated by Asians and then Europeans, who reintroduced horses to the Americas. In recent times, Americans had large horse-raising ranches, and some of the horses escaped to become what are today known as "wild" mustangs.

They’re dragging them away – Wild horses
2006, One Eleven Magazine
March – It may come as a surprise to many, but wild horses – the animals that blazed our trails, fought our wars, the very meaning of “don’t fence me in” – still roam the West. They live on public lands, or in parks, mostly in Nevada. Unfortunately, all of them are now under siege, victims of federal and state policies that have possibly pushed them to the brink of extinction. These policies involve unchecked roundups of mustang populations, waged with virtually no media scrutiny.

Questions surround wild horse sales plan
2006, Casper Star Tribune
Feb. 27 - Last week the Public Lands Council -- a ranchers' group -- and the Bureau of Land Management sent out 15,000 letters to ranchers who use BLM lands in the West to consider adopting some of the older wild horses now in BLM holding facilities. The BLM says if these horses, numbering about 7,000, are moved, it will make room for more horses to be rounded up from ranges. Pat Fazio, statewide coordinator for the Wyoming Animal Network, questioned why ranchers would want to adopt horses. "These are the very people that wanted them off the land, and now they want them back?" she said. A central question in the debate is whether wild horses can be sold to slaughter for human consumption. Niels Hansen, a Rawlins rancher and chairman of the Wyoming State Grazing Board, said he doesn't see a problem with selling old, unusable horses to slaughterhouses. He also said if he were to buy horses from the BLM under this program -- the agency is seeking $10 per horse -- and then sold them to someone else who then sent them to slaughter, he might be liable. "I don't know how to get around this and how to protect myself," he said.

Of Rocks, Creeks and Broom-Tailed Horses
2006, LA Weekly
Feb. 1 - Will California’s own wild mustangs ever return to Coyote Canyon? Should they? Among other things, the official reports said that the horses were starving and dying of thirst and therefore needed to be rounded up. Such was not the case, but no matter: A plan was in place and, one day in 2003, the contractor from Utah who makes his living rounding up wild horses on public lands all over the West arrived with his team, his truck, his chopper and his portable corral and chute and set the trap.

BLM gathers 672 horses at Monte Cristo
2006, Ely Times
Jan. 26 Ely, NV, - The Bureau of Land Management and Forest Service had by Tuesday gathered 672 wild horses from the complex that is located primarily in northeastern Nye County. The federal agencies anticipate gathering as many as 840 wild horses from the complex, which consists of three BLM herd management areas and one Forest Service wild horse territory. Approximately 700 of the gathered horses will be placed in the BLM's Adopt-a-Horse-or-Burro Program. The remainder will be released.

Wild Horse Round-Up
2006, KLAS TV
Jan. 13, Las Vegas, NV - Wild horse advocates took on the Bureau of Land Management during a special meeting Thursday night. The BLM plans to move most of the wild horse herd out of Red Rock Canyon, but wild horse advocates say it is unnecessary and they claim the agency will not repopulate the herd. Jerry Reynoldson, wild horse advocate, said, "I haven't heard anything to suggest to me they know conclusively they need to remove these horses from Red Rock. They simply want to do that."

BLM plans round-up of Red Rock Canyon wild horses near Las Vegas
2006, Associated Press
Jan. 6, Las Vegas, NV - The Bureau of Land Management plans to round up and remove most of a herd of wild horses in the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area. The agency says it plans next month to remove 19 of 35 horses from the area about 20 miles west of Las Vegas -- and add four mares to the herd next year from the BLM's Wheeler Pass Herd Management Area. A spokeswoman with the National Wild Horse Association says she doubts the BLM will follow through with reintroducing horses to the area in years to come.

BLM slates Monte Cristo horse gather for Jan. 6
2005, Ely Times
Dec. 23, Ely District, NV – The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Battle Mountain and Ely field offices are scheduled to begin gathering and removing wild horses from the Monte Cristo Complex on January 6. The BLM and Forest Service anticipate gathering about 840 wild horses during the approximately 20-day gather period. About 700 head will be removed during this gather as the BLM strives to achieve an appropriate management level of about 285 on the range.

Bright Idea: Alliance seeks to stem wild horse births
2005, Albuquerque Tribune
Dec. 12 - It's birth control for wild horses who prove fertile in their free-roaming lives on the nation's Western countryside. It's developed from pig ovaries and injected in a mare's hips. Called PZP, the contraceptive gave birth to an agreement between a federal agency and the Humane Society of the United States at a meeting late last month in Santa Fe. The Bureau of Land Management and the Humane Society announced they would work together to further development and use of PZP on mares living on federal land in 10 Western states.

Congress agrees to increase in Shackleford ponies' herd size
2005, Picayune Item
Raleigh, N.C., Nov. 19 - Congress has given the National Park Service
permission to increase the size of the wild horse herd on Shackleford Banks, a change intended to help maintain the herd's viability while still preventing it from stripping the island's resources. Since 1998, federal law has dictated that the "banker ponies" - descendants of animals brought by Spanish explorers - should number at least 100 and no more than 130. The mandate is meant to maintain the herd's genetic diversity without straining the resources of the grassy barrier island where they live, part of the Cape Lookout National Seashore. The herd's base size will increase to 110 and it will periodically be allowed to expand to 130 or more, under a bill approved by unanimous consent Wednesday by the U.S. Senate, U.S. Rep. Walter Jones said. The House already approved the measure.

BLM Sale Program: Potential buyers back out after agency imposes fines for selling animals to slaughter
2005, Las Vegas Review Journal
Washington D.C., Oct. 31 - The federal government is looking for homes for more than 400 wild horses after buyers this spring pulled out of revised contracts imposing criminal penalties for selling the animals to slaughter. Twenty individuals and two tribes seeking 427 wild horses canceled their contracts after the Bureau of Land Management in April suspended its infant sale program amid reports of horse slaughter, according to interviews with BLM officials and agency records obtained by the Las Vegas Review-Journal through a Freedom of Information Act request. "A number of these individuals had completed the necessary paperwork, some even had sent checks paying for their animals. However, they still decided not to complete the purchases and backed out," BLM spokesman Tom Gorey said.

BLM wants to remove most horses near Muddy Gap
2005, Casper Star Tribune
Lander, Wyo., Sept. 11 - Federal wild horse managers plan to remove most of the wild horse population near Whiskey Mountain west and southwest of Muddy Gap this fall. Roy Packer, range management specialist at the Lander Field Office of the Bureau of Land Management, said the roundup operation would be similar to one completed last year in the Antelope Hills area of the Red Desert.

BLM trims wild horse herds
2005, Casper Star Tribune
Adobe Town, Wyo., Aug. 24 - Wild horse managers are rounding up horses in southwest Wyoming this week and through September in an effort to drastically reduce the number of horses on certain public lands. Alan Shepherd, wild horse program lead for the Bureau of Land Management in Wyoming, said there are now about 1,200 horses in Adobe Town in southern Sweetwater County, and the agency aims to gather 1,000. Of those, 600 will be removed from the population and put into the adoption program. The rest will be released in other areas. Another roundup is planned to begin Labor Day in the Salt Wells Creek area, also in southern Sweetwater County, where there are now about 625 horses. About 500 will be gathered, and 300 will be removed.

Cowboys corral Spring Creek mustangs
2005, Cortez Journal
Disappointment Valley, Colo. - Four full days of wild mustang wrangling was watered down to one this past weekend as the U.S. Bureau of Land Management and some Utah cowboys were able to round up the Spring Creek Basin herd in a matter of hours. Ninety horses were corralled Sunday from about 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. in Southwest Colorado northeast of Dove Creek. Animals were marshaled to help minimize impacts to forage health and vigor of the region. Of the total, 73 were adult studs or mares and 17 were foals. Another five horses were spotted by helicopter and not captured.

Roundup splits up desert herd
2005, Denver Post
Slick Rock, Colo., Aug. 23 - In human terms, the helicopter roundup and disposition of 90 wild horses in southwestern Colorado on Sunday and Monday went as smoothly as possible. But in those two days, the equine social order of the Spring Creek herd fractured, with families split up and homes lost forever. Wranglers for the Bureau of Land Management took all 73 adults and 17 foals off their desert range in Disappointment Valley, a landscape of crumbling buttes, drab knobs and alkali gullies that usually lives up to its name. Cortez veterinarian Susan Grabbe said no horses - or wranglers - were seriously injured, not even during the fierce kicking and biting that goes on once wild horses are crowded together in pens. Then individual fates were sealed Monday morning with the pointing of a BLM finger.

Wild horses' fans fear roundups will weaken herds
2005, Billings Gazette
Aug. 20 - Wild-horse advocates are concerned that the roundup of up to 10,000 wild horses and burros across the West this year will lower their populations drastically and threaten the animals' genetic diversity. "You cannot preserve this gene pool with such reductions," said Karen Sussman, president of the Society for the Protection of Mustangs and Burros. "Each herd has a significant historical value." The Bureau of Land Management, the agency responsible for managing the herds, will hold 57 gathers this year in nine Western states. In the past three years, the agency has removed 10,000 horses each year from federal lands.

Development, wild horse tourism conflict on Outer Banks
2005, The Daily Advance of Elizabeth City
Elizabeth City, N.C., Aug. 14 - Carova's road-less, undeveloped stretch of beach is an ideal habitat for the famed Corolla wild horses, and is drawing hundreds of tourists daily to view the free-roaming herds. It is also fast becoming a draw for developers eyeing vacant, sandy lots ready for construction. While the horses' presence has inspired tour-guide businesses and souvenir sales throughout the Outer Banks, development may be pushing that aside. As vacation homes and resort hotels are being considered for development by Currituck County government, the Corolla wild horses are at risk of becoming extinct, some local business owners say.

Hundreds of horses rounded up by BLM
2005, Elko Daily
Elko, Nev., Aug. 11 - U.S. Bureau of Land Management's gathering of wild horses in the Buck and Bald Complex has ended with 795 horses transported to Palomino Valley. A total of 850 horses were gathered at Buck and Bald in the Ely BLM district, and 55 were returned to the herd management areas making up the complex, according to BLM spokeswoman Maxine Shane.

Pryor horses overcome foal losses of 2004
2005, The Billings Gazette
Aug. 4 - Nature has a way of putting all things to the test. Last year, it was the Pryor Mountain wild-horse herd's turn. Only one of 28 foals survived, mostly because of hungry mountain lions on the hunt. This year, the herd bounced back. Nearly every mare capable of getting pregnant got pregnant. Of the 35 foals produced, 28 have survived, enough to make up for the 2004 losses. "The herd responded," said Linda Coates-Markle, wild-horse manager for the Bureau of Land Management in Billings. The herd, which numbers around 167, roams the BLM's 40,000-acre range in the Pryor Mountains, a mix of rolling lowlands and pine-covered uplands about 80 miles south of Billings.

Congressional Copout
2005, Baltimore Sun
July 28 – Here’s how it works in Congress: When the chairman of a Senate appropriations subcommittee sneaks something into the law and 259 House members vote to take it out, the senator gets his way. That's why House and Senate negotiators agreed - despite overwhelming opposition from the House - to leave unchanged a statute championed last year by Montana Sen. Conrad Burns allowing wild horses to be sold for slaughter.

Wild Horses: BLM keeps herd in check
2005, Las Vegas Review-Journal
Eureka, Nev., July 10 - The band of horses came into view around a small hill, followed closely by a low-flying helicopter that herded the animals toward a wide funnel of camouflage netting. The horses, galloping in a tight group, passed through the gate of a small enclosure, which quickly was slammed shut.

Wild and free
2005, Boston Globe
July 4 - As we gather today on town squares and parade down Main Street to proclaim our 229th birthday, let us pause to consider the wild horse -- the great American icon, the fleet-footed wind-drinker that our country rode in on. Pressed into service by the thousands, the wild horse blazed our trails, fought our wars, spilled rivers of blood. Often our cavalry horses were known by number only. Sometimes they had names. I speak of Comanche, a mustang that fought with Custer at the Battle of the Little Big Horn. It was 1876, the year of our centennial, on June 25, that Custer made his famous last stand.
At the time, 2 million wild horses roamed the West. By 1950, there were 50,000. Today, there are perhaps 28,000. What happened? World War I, the pet food industry, and cattle ranchers, who contend that wild horses steal food from cows, and just may, under the Bush administration, finally realize their dream of seeing wild horses permanently wiped from public lands.

Iron County men who killed 9 wild horses sent to prison
2005, Salt Lake Tribune
June 30 - Frustrated over watching wild horses graze on grass they had planted for cattle, two Iron County ranch workers say they reached the breaking point and "just lost it." Picking up their rifles, they began shooting, they said. By the time it was over, nine horses were dead. For their crime, the two Enterprise men, Fred Eugene Woods, 48, and Russell Weston Jones, 30, were sentenced Wednesday to five months in prison, followed by five months of home arrest. U.S. District Judge David Winder also ordered them to pay restitution of $2,005 to cover the value of the animals. "Horses are the living symbols of the free spirit of the West," the judge said. "The victims are the American people."

Horse plan draws ire
2005, Associated Press
Reno, , Nev., June 25 - Horse protection advocates said Tuesday that they'll oppose a proposal aimed at boosting adoptions of wild horses unless Congress also bans the slaughter of any horses in the U.S. Leaders of the Humane Society of the United States and other groups said they favor part of the proposal introduced by Nevada's entire congressional delegation Monday to impose a one-year waiting period on the transfer of ownership for wild horses sold through a relatively new sale program at the U.S. Bureau of Land Management. But they said other provisions in the bill would undermine protections for the mustangs unless the bill is accompanied by the slaughter ban, which has passed the House and is awaiting action in the Senate.

Starving adopted mustang found tied to tree, rescued
2005, Kern Valley Sun
Ranger, a six-year-old mustang, was tied to a tree in the forest for months without adequate food or water. But he's in horse heaven now - an earthly one, in Southlake, with other mustangs and even a couple of burros for company, with lots of fresh hay and even a lake view. "He was skin and bones," said Karen Knippel, a Bureau of Land Management Wild Horse and Burro Program volunteer. "He had dull eyes and was lethargic. He was barely hanging on."Ranger's story is one as tangled as a mustang's tail and is an example of how adopted BLM horses and burros can fall through the cracks of the system, starting out with a good home but ending up in a bad way.

Nevadans seek to change wild horse sales plan
2005, Las Vegas Sun
Washington, D.C., June 20 - Nevada's lawmakers want to make it easier for people to adopt wild horses and want to provide more protection for older horses purchased through a new program. Bills to be introduced in the House and Senate today would reduce minimum horse adoption fees by 80 percent, eliminate the limit of four titles per adopter per year and would establish a one-year waiting period for buyers to receive titles to wild horse purchased through the new sales program. The government's wild horse adoption program has been around since 1973, according to BLM spokesman Tom Gorey. More than 205,000 animals have been adopted since then, he said. The minimum bidding fee is $125, which Porter's bill would reduce, and the horses go to the highest bidder. Adopters can adopt more than four horses a year, but can only receive titles for four horses in a 12-month period. Gorey said someone could adopt 10 horses but would not have all the titles until three years later. Porter's bill would eliminate that limit, so adopters could get all the titles to their horses after a year.

Land Study on Grazing Denounced
2005, Los Angeles Times
June 18 - The Bush administration altered critical portions of a scientific analysis of the environmental impact of cattle grazing on public lands before announcing Thursday that it would relax regulations limiting grazing on those lands, according to scientists involved in the study. A government biologist and a hydrologist, who both retired this year from the Bureau of Land Management, said their conclusions that the proposed new rules might adversely affect water quality and wildlife, including endangered species, were excised and replaced with language justifying less stringent regulations favored by cattle ranchers.

Government eases rules for livestock that graze on federal land
2005, USA Today
Denver, Colo., June 17 - Thousands of ranchers whose livestock graze on government land will face less burdensome federal regulations under new rules announced Thursday. The regulations, which go into effect in mid-August, reverse some of the key changes pushed through by the Clinton administration to protect 160 million acres of rangeland in the West. The rules announced by the Bureau of Land Management will affect those who hold about 18,000 grazing permits. Ranchers currently pay $1.79 a month for a cow or calf to graze on government land. That fee will not change. Tom Lustig, a Colorado-based attorney for the National Wildlife Federation, and other environmentalists criticized the change as a giveaway to the ranching industry that will make it harder to crack down on overgrazing and other harmful practices, and limit public comment on grazing decisions made by the government. "It cuts out the public," Lustig said. "It will be extremely difficult to remedy grazing that is causing problems."

Wild-horse saga not finished
2005, Billings Gazette
Lovell, Wyo., June 10 - Hope Ryden went to Lovell in 1968 looking for a story. The ABC producer had little experience with horses. She only knew a fight was brewing over the wild mustangs that roamed the Pryor Mountains. The Bureau of Land Management planned to rid the land of the "trespass horses." A group of Lovell townsfolk bucked, saying the horses belonged there. "It was getting vindictive. It sounded like a range war," Ryden said. "I had to ask … which was it, trespassing horses or national treasure?" She found a "gem on the mountaintop" in the herds of horses, she said.

More protection for state's wild horses OK'd by House
2005, Las Vegas Sun
Washington, D.C., June 9 - The House agreed to ban federal funding for inspectors at horse slaughterhouses and border inspection sites on Wednesday, adding another potential layer of protection for the Nevada's wild horse population. Last month the House agreed to ban the Bureau of Land Management sales of wild horses after the government discovered dozens had been bought and then resold to slaughterhouses that sold the meat to foreign countries. Sales have resumed, unless the Senate agrees to the same ban, but the BLM has implemented stricter guidelines and consequences for those who buy horses and do not intend to care for them. But Wednesday's amendment, approved 269 to 158, offered by Rep. John Spratt, D-S.C., and Rep. John Sweeney, R-N.Y., aims to end horse slaughter for human consumption overall.

Turf war over West's wild horses
2005, Associated Press
Palomino Valley, Nev., June 7 - They are revered as majestic, galloping icons of the American West — or reviled as starving, disfigured varmints that rob ranchers of their livelihood. Wild horses and burros are stirring emotional debate from Western rangelands to the halls of Congress after dozens of horses were slaughtered legally in April. Protections for the mustangs that might have prevented the slaughter were repealed in December, but now some in Congress are pushing a measure to reinstate those protections. The bill has passed the House and is headed to the Senate. The debate is the latest in a decades-old turf battle that’s literally about the turf — that is, the grass, which grows thick in wet years and disappears in drought.

Nevadans choose wild horse design for state quarter
2005, Las Vegas Sun
Carson City, June 2 - The wild horse is going to be the Nevada theme on a 25-cent piece to be minted in January next year and distributed nationwide. State Treasurer Brian Krolicki said today that nearly 60,000 people voted in the contest to choose one of five designs for the state's quarter. The wild horses were a clear winner. Even though the issue of wild horses has been controversial, Krolicki said this was "a beautiful design" with three wild horses, the Sierra Nevada in the background with the sun rising and the sagebrush on both sides. The motto is "Morning in Nevada." Krolicki said the mustang design gathered 18,900 votes or 32 percent of the people who cast ballots either online or by mail. He said voting by children "made the difference" for the winning wild horse design. He estimated that 25 percent of the vote came from children, including his daughter Kate, favoring the wild horses.

They Have To Be Free
2005, ESPN.com
On the chilly Friday morning of Jan. 21 last, scores of students from Damonte Ranch High School in South Reno, Nev., streamed out the school's doors and moved en masse to a jury-rigged corral near the front entrance of the campus. A snowstorm in the nearby mountains of the Virginia Range had driven a small herd of wild horses down to the valley in search of forage, and a crew of state agricultural cowboys had rounded them up. From there they would be trucked off to a holding center, where they would be vetted for worms and disease, then offered up for adoption. What had brought so many students out in force was the fear, fed by a flurry of recent news reports out of Washington, D.C., that these wind-blown beasts – for years perceived as the nation's symbols of unfettered freedom – had been captured for the purpose of being sold at auction, slaughtered and cut up as steaks for dinner tables spread from France to Japan. In such countries, horse meat is a delicacy.

Saving wild horses
2005, Louisville Courier-Journal
Washington, D.C., May29 - The Senate must have been horsing around last year while Sen. Conrad Burns, R-Mont., slipped a dubious provision lifting the 1971 ban on sales of wild horses into a spending bill. After it was discovered that the sales sent 41 horses to the slaughterhouse, the House voted this month to reinstate the ban, which can be supported on solid grounds. First, there are only 27,000 wild horses and 4,000 wild burros on government land in Western states. Allowing the sale of these animals could endanger the species. Second, processing wild horses for food consumption overseas could pose health risks to consumers, since virtually nothing is known of the history of the animals, which are not raised to become meat. Third, a compromise is available if philanthropists follow the lead of Ford Motor Co., which has set up a donation fund to save these horses. Such action could ease the concerns ranchers have for securing their lands and taxpayers may have with the costly price tag of protecting wild horses.

Government contract keeps rancher in business - Wild horses help tame a way of life
2005, Kansas City Star
Bartlesville, Okla., May 29 - Dwarfed by a huge hoop of blue sky unspooling above him, John Hughes drives his pickup along rutted roads into the low sloping hills of his ranch. Brown mustangs graze in the ankle-high grass. In 1988 [Hughes] received a Bureau of Land Management contract to keep aging herds of wild horses. Today, Hughes has about 1,200 horses on his 12,500-acre ranch and 2,800 more on other ranches near Bartlesville. "We're an old folks home for unwanted horses." He's not alone. Seven ranches - three others in Oklahoma and three in Kansas - keep 13,600 wild horses. That's about as many as remain on the range in all the Western states except Nevada and Wyoming.

SLAUGHTER OF 41: House votes to halt horse sales - Montana senator: Amendment dead on arrival, marketplace works
2005, Las Vegas Review Journal
Washington, D.C., May20 - House lawmakers voted Thursday to end federal wild horse sales and brushed aside promises of new protections the government put in place this week to prevent animals from being resold for slaughter. A 22-minute debate pitted gruesome images of horses butchered to make a buck against horses left to starve on public lands or penned up in government corrals. "The very notion that the wild American horse will be slaughtered as a food source for foreign gourmets has struck a chord with the American people," said Rep. Nick Rahall, D-W.Va., who proposed the sales be ended. The vote was seen as a victory for animal welfare activists. But it might not last long. When the amendment reaches the Senate, Sen. Conrad Burns, R-Mont., plans "to throw it out." "I'm in the livestock business, and I've bought and sold horses all my life," Burns said Thursday. "Basically, the marketplace works."

House moves to block sales of wild horses and burros.
2005, Associated Press
Washington, D.C., May 19 - Lawmakers voted Thursday to block a six-month-old law that allows the government to sell wild horses and burros, with opponents of the law protesting that the animals were ending up in processing plants and on the tables of foreign restaurants. The 249-159 House vote would stop the Bureau of Land Management from using any money in a $26.2 billion bill funding next year's natural resources and arts programs to sell horses that roam public lands in Western states. The measure overturns a provision in a spending bill passed last December that ended a 33-year-old policy of protecting wild horses from sale or processing. The horses, said Rep. Nick Rahall, D-W.Va., shouldn't be sold so they "can end up on the menus of France, Belgium and Japan."

U.S. will resume selling wild horses
2005, USA Today
Denver, Co., May 19 - The federal Bureau of Land Management will announce Thursday it is resuming sales of wild horses with protections to prevent the animals from being sent to slaughter, the agency's director said Wednesday. The agency suspended the sales last month after discovering that 41 animals rounded up from Western rangeland had been sold to an Illinois slaughterhouse and processed for meat. In addition, Ford Motor Co. will pay to transport up to 2,000 horses to Indian reservations and locations run by non-profit organizations. The company will also oversee a "Save the Mustangs" fundraising drive to help groups that adopt the horses pay for their care. Wild horses are "a beautiful symbol of the Wild West" and an "icon" for Ford, said Jon Harmon, a spokesman for the company whose Mustang sports car has been a flagship brand since 1964.

Horse advocates want suspension of mustang roundups in Nevada
2005, Associated Press
Reno, Nev., May 17 - Wild horse protection advocates urged the Bureau of Land Management Tuesday to suspend all roundups of the mustangs in Nevada until Congress makes it illegal again to sell the older, excess, unwanted ones for slaughter. But BLM officials said halting plans to gather as many as 4,000 mustangs from the Nevada range in the coming year would cripple a long-term effort that's within a year of bringing horse numbers down to sustainable levels.

Burns says Reid backed bill limiting wild horse protection
2005, Las Vegas Sun
Reno, Nev., May 12 - Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., a well-known defender of wild horses in Nevada and the West, has been accused of supporting changes to long-standing protections for the horses -- changes that have led at least 41 wild horses to the slaughterhouse. At the center of the issue is the controversial "Burns amendment," which was introduced by Sen. Conrad Burns, R-Mont. The amendment allows the BLM for the first time in the agency's history to sell wild horses to anyone, including horse traders looking to make a quick buck by selling the previously protected animals to slaughterhouses. Burns introduced the amendment into the immense federal budget bill last fall. Burns' spokesman, James Pendleton, said that Reid assisted Burns in drafting the amendment despite Reid's very public opposition to the amendment.

Critics oppose fence by The Nature Conservancy
2005, Associated Press
Reno, Nev., May 9 - The Nature Conservancy says complaints about a barbed wire fence at the MacCarran Ranch east of Sparks are based on misunderstandings. The 300-foot fence put up about a year ago has cut off a path traditionally used by wild horses to drink from the Truckee River at the McCarran Ranch. Nature Conservancy spokesman Michael Cameron says the fence was installed to help keep horses away from the nearby Tahoe-Reno Industrial Park and Wild Horse Adult Resort brothel. But after horse advocates complained, he says the bottom strands of fence have been replaced with smooth wire so foals and fawns won't be harmed. The state Department of Agriculture is recommending a permanent watering hole be built elsewhere along the river. About 300 horses roam the mountains south of the ranch.

Wild Horses Sold by U.S. Agency Sent to Slaughter
2005, National Geographic
May 5 - The U.S. government has halted its sale of wild horses while it investigates two separate incidents of mustangs being resold for human consumption. The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is responsible for managing the 37,000 wild horses on public lands, mainly in Nevada, Oregon, and Wyoming. The agency's mission changed in December, when Congress passed a bill that made it legal for the BLM to sell wild horses outright. Supporters of the law said its goal is to reduce the number of horses that BLM keeps in holding facilities and to reduce the agency's horse-care costs. Previously the agency had been allowed to sell wild horses, but titles to horses were not turned over until one year later. Since December the BLM has sold about a thousand wild horses under the new rules. The slaughtered horses were originally sold to the Rosebud Sioux Indians in South Dakota and to an unnamed Oklahoma man who said he wanted the horses for a church youth program.

BLM to hold hearing on helicopter wild-horse roundups
2005, Nevada Appeal
May 5 - The sometimes-controversial topic of helicopter use in rounding up wild horses will be up for discussion with federal land managers at a public hearing scheduled for later this month. Animal rights groups and wild-horse advocates have criticized the practice in the past as cruel and dangerous to the easily spooked equines, although Bureau of Land Management spokesperson Maxine Shane said few complaints have surfaced in recent years. The BLM uses helicopters to gather horse population numbers as well as to gather the horses themselves.

Endangered U.S. horses avoid slaughter
How the mustangs were saved: Canada welcomes equine refugees
2005, The Globe and Mail
Toronto, Canada, Apr. 29 - Six weeks ago Randy Bird stood on a government ranch in Rock Springs, Wyo., watching as a herd of endangered wild mustangs galloped around the paddock, terrorized by his human scent. Today he feeds his own small herd by hand on his ranch near Harwood, Ont., east of Toronto. "They'd never seen a tree or a barn or even eaten grain when they arrived," he said proudly. "Now they come straight up to the fence when I call them." If it hadn't been for Mr. Bird and the efforts of a little-known Canadian group called the Save the Mustangs Foundation, nine mustangs would likely be dead -- sold by the Bureau of Land Management to so-called kill-buyers under a controversial new U.S. law that allows mustangs over the age of 10 to be sold "without limitations." It was a close call for these Canadian equine refugees, who have become poster ponies for a drive to raise awareness of the plight of these historic horses in the United States.

Animal advocates demand halt in state wild horse sales
2005, Parhump Valley Times
Washington, D.C., Apr. 27 - Animal rights advocates on Friday demanded Interior Secretary Gale Norton put a stop to wild horse sales until the government writes new rules to protect them from being slaughtered. A West Virginia lawmaker said the destruction of six horses this week would ring a "wake up call" for Congress to re-examine a law it passed last year relaxing sales of the animals. Government officials and wild horse groups stepped up investigations Friday following the disclosure that the horses had been bought on April 15 and resold to a meat plant in DeKalb, Ill., three days later. The initial buyer was identified Friday by horse advocate groups as Dustin Herbert of Meeker, Okla. Two government sources confirmed Herbert as the purchaser. Attempts to contact Herbert at his home were unsuccessful. A phone message said his answering machine had been turned off.

Coalition hopes to stop horse slaughter
2005, cnn.com
Washington, D.C., Apr. 27 - A coalition of celebrities, race track leaders and others is pressing for action on legislation that would end or limit the slaughter of wild horses Lawmakers have tried for years to stop the killing of wild horses and burros at three U.S. slaughterhouses that send the meat for consumption overseas. The effort gained momentum last year after Congress replaced a 34-year-old ban on selling wild mustangs and burros with a plan that allows the sale of older, unwanted horses. One current proposal would stop the commercial sale of wild horses and burros. A second measure would ban the slaughter of horses in the United States. "When you've got a coalition ranging from (country singer) Willie Nelson to ("Desperate Housewives' star) Nicollette Sheridan, we've got something for everyone," said Nancy Perry, the Humane Society of the United States' vice president of government affairs.

Lawmakers hope to save wild horses
2005, Las Vegas Sun
Washington, D.C., Apr. 27 - The recent slaughter of wild horses sold by the federal government should give momentum to new legislation that would halt the killing of animals that many consider to be an icon of the American West, Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., said. Nevada has the most wild horses of any state, roughly 19,000, according to the Bureau of Land Management. That's more than half of roughly 37,000 total in the West, according to the BLM's February 2004 estimate. Ensign next month plans to introduce a bill that would ban slaughter of horses for human consumption, Ensign said. A similar bill has been introduced in the House. "The love affair that I have with horses is the same as a lot of Americans have had since the beginning of this country," said Ensign, a veterinarian who as a boy rode horses in the Lake Tahoe meadow where the opening credits of the longtime television show "Bonanza" were filmed. The Humane Society of the United States has been flooded with calls, pleading with the group to save the wild horses, said Nancy Perry, vice president of governmental affairs. "This has been an un-American experience these last few weeks, few months," Perry said today. "Our deep concern has turned to outrage and frustration."

More wild horses slaughtered at Cavel as Interior Department, Ford unite to save 52
2005, Daily Chronicle
Washington, D.C., Apr. 26 - The Interior Department abruptly halted delivery of mustangs to buyers while it investigates the slaughter of 41 wild horses at the Cavel International plant in DeKalb this month. By enlisting last-minute financial help Monday from Ford Motor Co. - makers of the Mustang sports car - the agency saved the lives of 52 other mustangs. The latest horses killed came from a broker who obtained them from the Rosebud Sioux Tribe of South Dakota. The tribe traded 87 of the 105 aging horses it bought from the government for younger ones. Interior officials said they would review whether a federal contract had been violated. Tribal officials were unavailable for comment. The department also is investigating this month's sale of six wild horses to an Oklahoma man and their slaughter at the Cavel plant, the same place 35 of the 87 horses traded by the tribe were killed.

Interior Department Looking into slaughtering of Wild Horses
2005, KATC
Washington, D.C., Apr. 26 - The Interior Department has abruptly halted delivery of wild mustangs to buyers while it investigates the slaughter of 41 wild horses in the West this month. The latest horses killed had come from a broker who obtained them from a Native American tribe in South Dakota. The department is also investigating this month's sale of six wild horses to an Oklahoma man and their slaughter.

35 More Wild Horses Killed in the West
2005, Associated Press
Washington, D.C., Apr. 25 - Thirty-five more wild horses rounded up in the West were slaughtered Monday, but the Interior Department acted quickly to save the lives of 52 other mustangs by enlisting last-minute financial help from Mustang sports car maker Ford Motor Co. The horses killed came from a broker who obtained them from the Rosebud Sioux Tribe of South Dakota. The tribe traded 87 of the 105 aging horses it bought from the government for younger ones. Interior officials said they would review the arrangement to see if it violated a federal contract with the agency. Tribal officials were unavailable for comment. The latest killings bring to 41 the number of wild horses slaughtered since Congress removed protections for mustangs in December. Just last week, six were slaughtered that had been sold to a private owner. Both incidents occurred at the Cavel International Inc. commercial packing plant in DeKalb, Ill.

Dakota tribes rescue at-risk mustangs
2005, Indian Country
New Town, N.D. - Two Dakota tribes have stepped in to rescue hundreds of mustangs that many horse advocates feared were headed to the slaughterhouse. The Rosebud Sioux Tribe of South Dakota and the Three Affiliated Tribes in North Dakota each purchased more than 200 wild horses, at a cost of a dollar apiece, from the Bureau of Land Management in late March. Tribal officials said the decision to buy the mustangs was based as much on the past, as it is on the future. 'We wanted to play a role in the preservation of these wild mustangs,'' said Richard Mayer, CEO for the Three Affiliated Tribes, consisting of the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara nations. ''The lineage of these horses can be traced back to our ancestors. These animals are part of our heritage and are really holy to us. They deserve to be protected.''

Meeker resident accused in slaughter of wild horses
2005, The Oklahoman
Six wild horses bought by a Meeker man for use in a church-run program were instead sold to an Illinois slaughterhouse three days later, animal rights groups claimed Friday. The April 15 sale -- and the buyer's estimated $2,000 profit -- are being investigated by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management. However, even if the buyer used a phony story, authorities have no recourse because "once sold, these horses are private property," bureau spokeswoman Celia Boddington said. The sale was made possible by last-minute language slipped into a 3,300-page federal budget bill on the eve of Thanksgiving weekend, said Neda DeMayo, founder of Return to Freedom, a wild horse preservation group.

Six Wild Horses Slaughtered Under New Law
2005, Associated Press
Reno, NV, Apr. 22 - Six wild horses rounded up on federal land in the West and sold to a private owner have been slaughtered - four months after Congress did away with protection for wild mustangs, a government official said Thursday. "This is something we regret and are very disappointed'' about, said Celia Boddington, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Bureau of Land Management in Washington, D.C. "We make every possible effort when the horses are sold to make sure the animals are placed in good homes for long-term care.'' The BLM is investigating this month's sale of six wild horses to an Oklahoma man and their subsequent slaughter at a commercial packing plant in Illinois, Boddington said.

A Maryland model
2005, Baltimore Sun
Assateague Island, MD, Apr. 18 – Having spent most of his long career in Montana, Jay Kirkpatrick knows some folks out West find the wild horse roundups he performs on Assateague Island peculiar. Slogging through the marshy muck, searching with binoculars to identify scores of animals at long distance, he spends hours lining up just the right shots to send darts bearing contraceptive vaccine into the unsuspecting rumps of grazing mares. No lassos, no wranglers, no helicopters herding terrified equines into pens. Mr. Kirkpatrick is more gynecologist than cowboy. And yet the method he developed for managing wild horse populations is cheaper, more effective and far more humane than gathering up excess horses and trucking them off as they do out West. Yet today, the Bureau of Land Management is experimenting only with a relatively modest contraception program -- about 800 horses a year out of a total 37,000 -- limited by budget, restrictions on use of the vaccine and Western culture. If Congress doesn't actively encourage and facilitate a more aggressive effort, the 8,400 captive horses the bureau is trying to shed will be replaced again and again. Had the BLM instituted fertility controls 30 years ago when Mr. Kirkpatrick first suggested it, the agency wouldn't now be frantically seeking homes for thousands of horses that otherwise may be sold for slaughter.

Wild horse sanctuary proposal dies
2005, Billings Gazette
Billings, MT, Mar. 31 - A private company's proposal to help create a wild horse sanctuary on the Crow Reservation fell through with the passing of its deadline on Wednesday. “Our deal with the Crow is dead,” Merle Edsall said Thursday. Edsall and his company, ETH Inc., had signed a letter of intent with the Crow tribe in February to pay the tribe more than $1 million per year to look after 4,000 wild horses.

BLM announces first sale of wild horses to tribes
2005, Associated Press
Bismarck, N.D., Mar. 21 - The federal Bureau of Land Management says it is selling wild horses to American Indian tribes for the first time. The BLM has sold 141 horses to the Rosebud Sioux in South Dakota and 120 horses to the Three Affiliated Tribes in North Dakota. More sales are planned in the next several weeks, bringing the total to more than 500 horses.

Critics question horse buyer's idea
2005, Casper Star-Tribune
Mar. 18 - A Centennial horse rescuer is coming under fire from some in the animal rights community over statements he made about selling foals of wild horses to Mexico and Third World countries. Patricia Fazio of the Wyoming Animal Network said while she supports Hawkins' efforts to help wild horses, sending horses to Third World countries could be a "black hole" where the animals could be mistreated or killed for food.

Starving on the plains? A Burns spokesman tells why the senator changed the Wild Horse Act
2005, News Review
Mar. 17 - James Pendleton, who's called "J.P." and is a spokesman for Montana Sen. Conrad Burns, responded to our questions about the Burns Amendment.

Seeing America in a wild mustang
2005, Laramie Boomerang
March 13 - As the pickup truck bumped along the open country at the foot of Sheep Mountain between Laramie and Centennial, Hawkins pitchforked hay onto the hard ground. Dozens of wild mares, part of the nearly 200 mustangs that Wild Horses Wyoming LLC already owns, followed the truck at a dignified, but not skittish distance. The modern day agriculture man doesn’t retire to his bedroll and guitar; he retires to the Internet and his business, and marketing the wild horses’ foals is another potential avenue for revenue, Hawkins said. “There’s a viable agri-product that will come out. These foals will be marketed, and we’ve got some tremendous marketing ideas that we’d like to do. We’d like to get some sponsorship dollars to place these foals down in third world countries or in Mexico where a little village may need some horsepower to clear a field or to run a pump and produce water. What an honorable thing for these horses to provide their own care down the line,” Hawkins said.

Fighting for Wild Horses (audio)
2005, National Public Radio
March 10 - Tucked into the omnibus-spending bill passed in December was the repeal of a 34-year-old law that prohibited the slaughter of wild horses, including mustangs. Now, horse lovers are incensed, and the dispute divides cattlemen and wild horse advocates.

Government-Approved Slaughter
2005, OpEdNEws
Arizona, March 9 - Almost every day, a dozen or so wild burros come down from the foothills of the Black Mountains of northwestern Arizona onto the main street of Oatman, a revitalized high desert mining town about 15 miles from where California, Nevada, and Arizona meet. No one remembers when the burros first came into the mountain town that is bisected by the hairpin curves and switchbacks of Old Route 66, but they do know burros have lived in the area for more than a century. However, it wasn’t until the tourists began visiting the town in the early 1970s that the burros made their regular visits, arriving each day on no set schedule, but usually leaving about 4:30-5 p.m. when the tourists leave. The townspeople provide love, concern, funds for veterinarian bills, and two water troughs for the burros who work the Main Street tourist industry. Once protected by federal law, the nation’s 3,000 wild burros and 33,000 wild horses, as well as 24,000 horses in short- and long-term sanctuaries, now face Congressionally-approved slaughter.

Wild Horses Advocates Suspicious of Sale to Wyoming Rancher
2005, Las Vegas Eyewitness News
Las Vegas, NV, Mar. 2 - Advocates for wild horses say they are extremely suspicious about a sale of wild horses to a rancher in Wyoming. Two-hundred wild horses, some from Nevada, were sold to a Wyoming L.L.C. where they will supposedly live out their lives. But horse activists like Jerry Reynoldson say the deal was cut in secrecy and that once it goes through, there is no way to check on what happens to the horses. The owners can do what they want with the animals, even send them to slaughter. Wyoming ranchers haven't exactly been friendly to wild horses in the past. He adds that 600 more horses will be sold in the next few days and that BLM violated a promise to announce such sales well in advance.

First Nevada horses sold under new law
2005, Associated Press
Reno, NV, Mar. 1 - Wild horses that once roamed Nevada's open range have found a home in Wyoming under a new federal law that allows animals deemed too old or unfit for adoption to be sold and perhaps face slaughter. The sale announced Tuesday is the first under a new law passed by Congress and signed by President Bush in December as part of a spending bill that repealed a 34-year ban on selling wild horses. While the wild horses - symbols of the American West - are subject to slaughter under the law, the 200 mares rounded up in Nevada were sold to a Wyoming company committed to protecting the animals. Wild Horses Wyoming of Centennial, Wyo., about 30 miles west of Laramie, bought the lot of horses for $50 a piece for a total of $10,000.

Horse lovers want to reverse measure permitting slaughter
2005, USA Today
Ashland, OR, Mar. 1 - Wild horses, those defining icons of America's myth of the West, have always symbolized freedom and the frontier. But ranchers see them as competitors for grazing cattle across millions of acres of arid range - "hoofed locusts," as John Muir once said about sheep. And like the cougars and bears that have been showing up in residential areas, they're also competing with humans for habitat. Recently slipped into a federal appropriations bill by Sen. Conrad Burns (R) of Montana, and signed by President Bush, was a measure allowing the slaughter and export of horse meat from thousands of animals used to running free. Horse lovers are trying to get the measure reversed.

Two Utahans admit to killing nine wild horses
2005, Deseret News
Utah, Feb. 24 - Two Utah men Tuesday admitted to killing nine wild horses on federal land in Iron County. Fred Eugene Woods and Russell Wesley Jones each pleaded guilty to three criminal counts — one felony charge of injuring U.S. property and two misdemeanor counts of causing the death of a wild, free-roaming horse. Woods, 48, acknowledged shooting six horses — including a 1 1/2-year-old buckskin filly and a 4-year-old bay stallion — and Jones, 30, admitted killing three — including two black stallions, one 7 years old and the other 2 years old. The case is believed to be the first in which the killing of wild horses has resulted in a felony conviction.

Officials try to place horses: Government hopes tribes, groups take animals before sale
2005, Las Vegas Review Journal
Washington, Feb. 2 - The Bush administration is trying to persuade animal rights groups and American Indian tribes to shelter as many as 8,400 wild horses to avoid selling animals for possible slaughter. Bureau of Land Management director Kathleen Clarke said the agency is looking to place wild horses in safe environments as it carries out a law Congress passed last fall to speed horse and burro sales. "We have a law that we need to comply with, and we'd like to find positive ways to do that," Clarke said. The BLM next week will unveil a toll free phone number, 1-800-710-7597, and an e-mail at wildhorse@blm.gov to solicit proposals from the public.

A New Range War - A change in the law, and wild horses face slaughter
2005, Newsweek
Corraled in a federal holding pen at Palomino Valley, Nev., a buckskin mare with the number 9598 cold-branded in code on its neck suddenly faces an uncertain future. When the 12-year-old was rounded up in November as part of a federal program to humanely control the mustang population in the West, it looked as if it would be relocated to a grassy farm in Oklahoma or Kansas. But that all changed weeks later. Thanks to a controversial revision of the 1971 law protecting wild horses and burros, the mare could be sold, killed and butchered.

American horse meat coveted in Europe
2005, The Tribune
Jan. 28 - Once an ersatz beef of the poor, horse meat has morphed into a high-end fare of discerning European carnivores. And some of the world's tastiest comes from the United States, where mustangs roam the range buffing up on nothing but grass, according to European horse butchers. "They're wild horses, the taste of their meat is very, very good - extraordinary."

Wild Horses: Repeal of New Law Sought
2005, Las Vegas Review Journal
Washington, Jan. 26 - A top House Democrat introduced a bill on Tuesday repealing a new law that allows the federal government to sell wild horses to buyers interested in slaughter. "We need to stop this senseless and inhumane policy change before it can be carried out," Rep. Nick Rahall, D-W.Va., said. Rahall, the ranking Democrat on the House Resources Committee, criticized a new law that lifts long-standing restrictions on how many horses the Bureau of Land Management can sell, to whom and for what purpose.

BLM Rounds Up 238 Horses
2004, Elko Daily Free Press
Elko, NV, Dec. 24 - U.S. Bureau of Land Management had gathered 238 wild horses as of Wednesday afternoon as part of its Antelope Complex roundup in Elko County. BLM planned to put the horses on trucks today, and the operation will shut down this evening for the Christmas holiday and resume Dec. 27. BLM plans to gather 1,916 horses within 60 days and release 440 wild horses back onto the complex. The remainder will be available for adoption.

Save the Wild Horses
2004, Washington Times
Washington DC, Dec. 6 - Of all the unnecessary pork stuffed into this holiday season's bloated Omnibus Appropriations Bill, none strikes us as more deserving of an early grave than Sen. Conrad Burns' horse-slaughter amendment. The Montana Republican managed to sneak in this bad bit of pork that would effectively dismantle the Wild Free-Roaming Horse and Burro Act.

Federal Bill Imperils Drive to Save Wild Horses From Slaughter
2004, Philadelphia Inquirer
Washington DC, Dec. 6 - For many people, the wild horse is emblematic of the American West, an icon of history, freedom and spirit. But for those who raise cattle on the same lands that the horses thunder through, the animals are a nettlesome nuisance. Horse lovers want the animals protected. Many ranchers would just as soon see them dead. In a move that has appalled horse advocates and elated cattlemen, a Western senator quietly slipped into a 3,000-page spending bill a measure that could allow many wild horses to be sent to slaughter. Sen. Conrad Burns (R., Mont.) introduced the provision on the weekend before Thanksgiving, without public hearings or debate.

Advocates worry new law will lead to slaughter of healthy wild horses
2004, Nevada Appeal
Las Vegas, NV, Nov. 24 - Wild horse advocates say they're worried that healthy horses rounded up on the range could be sold for slaughter under a herd-thinning measure Congress passed over the weekend. Sen. Conrad Burns, R-Mont., chairman of the appropriations subcommittee that funds the BLM, placed the measure in a 3,000-page year-end spending bill after consulting with Sens. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., and Harry Reid, D-Nev., Burns spokeswoman Jennifer O'Shea said.

New Provision Would Allow Slaughtering of Wild Horses
2004, New York Times
Washington DC, Nov. 24 - In a reversal of three decades of government policy that protected all wild horses, a provision approved by Congress last weekend would allow some of them to be sold to slaughterhouses. The provision, attached to an omnibus spending bill by Senator Conrad Burns, Republican of Montana and chairman of the appropriations subcommittee with responsibility for the Interior Department, requires the sale of wild horses that have been rounded up and are more than 10 years old or have been unsuccessfully offered for adoption three times.

Wild Horses to be Rarer Sight
2004, Gazette Wyoming Bureau
Cody, WY, Nov. 5- Ken Martin turned his pastime of watching wild horses into a business three years ago and has since guided tourists into the 110,000-acre McCullough Peaks management area. But Martin will have to work harder to find the horses this summer, since 80 percent of the wild horses have been removed by the Bureau of Land Management to comply with the Cody Field Office's Resource Management Plan.

Oil and Gas Hold the Reins in the Wild West
2004, Washington Post
Parachute, CO, Sept. 25 - The last sanctuary of the West Douglas wild horse herd is a desolate, forbidding place, which is just how the horses like it. As many as 60 skittish sorrels and bays make their home on the steeper slopes and stony ridges north of here, abandoning the valleys to growing throngs of oil and gas men looking for places to drill. Now, even this refuge may soon be lost. The U.S. Interior Department, which has leased 93 percent of the horses' preserve to energy companies, recently unveiled plans for evicting the entire herd.

Wrangling techniques more humane than they once were
2004, Chicago Daily Herald
July 25 - Since he began wrangling in 1971, Dave Cattoor says he's driven wild horses from the range into corrals with everything from four-wheelers to planes. The owner of Cattoor Livestock, which is hired by the federal government to round up wild horses, says the current technique is the most humane. "Used to be, we knew we were going to lose a lot of horses," Cattoor says, referring to mustangs that die from exhaustion. "Now, we don't want to lose any." Still, humane groups charge that the animals are often driven too hard, and a pregnant mare can lose her fetus. […] [F]ive horses died during the week-and-a-half ordeal that ended Monday.

Wild horses available for adoption
2004, Pittsburgh Tribune
Wanna horse around? The U.S. Bureau of Land Management wants to give away horses it captured in the wild to deserving owners. The Bureau of Land Management is setting up adoption sites at 12 locations throughout the country, mostly in the West.

Wild horse roundups to begin
2004, Casper Star-Tribune
Green River, WY -- Federal officials plan to round up approximately 140 wild horses in central Wyoming later this month, according to the U.S. Bureau of Land Management. BLM Worland Field Manager Bill Hill said the agency is proposing to gather the excess wild horses from the BLM's Fifteen mile Wild Horse Herd Management Area (HMA). The proposal is to reduce the population from approximately 210 horses to about 70 horses within the HMA.

Wild Horse Budget Plan Troubling to Lawmakers
2004, Gazette Washington Bureau
Washington DC, April 30 - Lawmakers are skeptical of the Bureau of Land Management's proposal to increase the amount of money spent on wild horse and burro management. Western Republican lawmakers and BLM officials say the populations of wild horses and burros need to decrease. Environmental groups say the agency should reduce the numbers of domestic livestock that, like the wild horses and burros, graze on federal lands. Sen. Conrad Burns, R-Mont., chairman of the Senate panel that has jurisdiction over the BLM's budget, is concerned about the agency's proposal. "I think what we should do is put some language in this thing that allows the BLM to sell excess wild horses," Burns said. "I'd prefer to sell 'em to whomever. Maybe some of them will end up going to slaughter."

State, feds reach wild horse pact
2003, Casper Star-Tribune
Cheyenne, WY, Aug. 14 - Wyoming's wild horse population should be cut roughly in half thanks to an agreement state and federal officials announced Wednesday. The deal was hailed by representatives of the state and federal governments and the Wyoming Stock Growers Association, but an official from the Fund for Animals criticized the pact.

Wild Horse Adoption: BLM to Consider Suspending Procedure
2003, Las Vegas Review Journal
Washington DC, Nov. 5 - The Bureau of Land Management agreed Tuesday to study whether to suspend its wild horse adoption program that has been criticized as costly and ineffective. Taking advice from an advisory council, the agency will consider setting aside its Adopt-A-Horse program for several years to concentrate on reducing the number of animals in herds of wild horses and burros and shipping the animals to long-term facilities. The cost to the BLM to arrange an adoption is equal to three years of holding a horse at a long-term facility, said Jeff Rawson, BLM wild horse and burro group manager. Still, he added, the long-term holding costs may be greater.

Wild Horses: Plan Might Give 10,000 New Home - Safeguarding Health of Protected Animals Exported to Mexico is Key
2002, Las Vegas Review Journal
Dec. 16 - A Montana businessman and his partners are promoting a way to solve wild horse overpopulation in the West: ship 10,000 of the government-protected animals to a sanctuary in Mexico. Animal protection groups fear shipping wild horses south of the border would be tantamount to giving federally protected animals a death sentence at slaughter plants.

Left High and Dry
2002, U.S. News & World Report
Utah, Aug. 19 - A month after he discovered the emaciated carcasses of 55 wild horses around a dried-up water trough, Gale Bennett can't get the horrific skin-and-bone images out of his mind. "I can still see them at night, " says the veteran wild-horse specialist at Utah's King Top Herd Management Area.

Horses being rounded up by the state
2002, Nevada Appeal
Aug. 14 - Tuesday's helicopter roundup of horses from the Virginia Range netted 78 horses, most of which will be sent to a sanctuary in California [Ed. Note: the "sanctuary" operator was later convicted in the largest ever horse neglect case], said Paul Iverson, director of the Nevada Department of Agriculture. Iverson said the helicopter guided 79 horses into the catch pen, but one mare was killed when she tried to jump out of the pen. Thain, who watched over the roundup said "every now and again they just do something stupid."

Helicopter round up proceeds
2002, Nevada Appeal
July 6, Virginia City, NV - A helicopter roundup of wild horses will go forward unencumbered by a Storey County ordinance. District Judge Bill Maddox ruled Friday the state is not subject to the Storey County law banning helicopter roundups as too dangerous to horses.

A Roundup of Wild Horses Stirs Up a Fight in the West
2002, The New York Times
Feb. 25 - Here in Nevada, on a crisp, cold, sunny morning, the sight of wild horses galloping in tandem, their manes flying, was breathtaking -- until they came close enough to the wranglers for observers to notice how terrified they were. It was most likely the first time that the horses, which live deep in this high desert of northern Nevada, had seen a helicopter, a corral or a person. By midmorning the herd was on its first truck, crammed tight with about 40 other horses rounded up within a few hours by helicopter for the federal Bureau of Land Management, which planned to send them away for eventual adoption.

Battle for Room on the Range; In effort to balance federal land use, wild horses are being rounded up to give cattle more grazing room.
2002, Los Angeles Times
February 5 - The whisper quiet of the snowy valley was broken by the distant flutter of an approaching helicopter. Flying 15 feet above the pinyon, juniper and sage, it weaved and bobbed, herding a dozen wild horses toward a holding pen. The pilot wrangled the mustangs, snorting and whinnying, toward capture. Their coats gleamed with sweat; plumes of steam blew out of their nostrils. Such roundups landed the Bureau of Land Management in court last year over its strategy to solve a problem unique to the West: How to referee the use of 262 million acres of public lands between wild horses and commercial cattle, which compete for the same forage.

Colorado: Killing Wild Horses
2001, New York Times
December 21 - Five wild horses have been shot to death at close range on public lands this month, the federal Bureau of Land Management said. Last December, 37 wild horses were shot to death on public land in southern Wyoming. In March, six were killed in Nevada. All the cases are unsolved. In Colorado and Wyoming, ranchers have been involved in disputes over the wild horses.

Horse Adoption Program Challenged
2001, Associated Press
Wild horses put up for adoption by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management continue to be slaughtered, in some cases within weeks of the owner gaining title of the animal, according to agency records. Critics question how aggressively the agency is investigating adopters, who must sign a statement promising not to sell the horse to slaughter. "Not only is BLM not actually prosecuting people, but they're not even doing the investigation to try to figure it out and it seems like they don't want to know," said Howard Crystal, a Fund for Animals attorney.

Government Wants Nearly Half West’s Wild Horses Removed by 2005
2001, Associated Press
One of the last vestiges of the American West, the wild mustang, is so prosperous that federal land managers say they’re going to have to rein it in. Running free across parts of 10 Western states, the estimated 48,000 wild horses and burros are far too many for the range to sustain, the Bureau of Land Management has concluded. The agency wants nearly half of the 25,000 in Nevada removed and placed in adoption programs in coming years, and they’re counting on the Bush administration to provide the money for more of the roundups.

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www.wildhorsepreservation.org is credited as source.