Bureau of Land Management and U.S. Geologic Survey press release touts software application instead of fixing their highly flawed wild horse management paradigm

YREKA, CA, US, March 3, 2023 /EINPresswire.com/ -- A recent joint press release by The U.S. Geological Survey (‘USGS’) and the Bureau of Land Management (‘BLM’) announced the public release of a new modeling program called ‘PopEquus’ designed to predict the potential outcomes of using various non-lethal methods to manage and protect wild horses roaming public lands.

When the BLM says ‘non-lethal’, at the best it means roundups of wild horses resulting in families torn apart, horses branded and horses genetically mutilated (stallions castrated and mares treated with chemicals causing sterilization) before they are placed in off-range corrals.

At best, it means wild horses being stalked by shooters with high-powered (lethal) gas operated firearms that shoot a heavy syringe filled with a chemical (‘PZP’ or ‘Gonacon’) that sterilizes a horse.

This flawed method for attempting to do what nature does via Natural Selection flawlessly via Apex predators, has very serious unintended consequences:

1. Adverse genetic and social impacts on wild horses via the use of chemical sterilants: https://cmvnunez.weebly.com/
2. Shooting horses with high-powered gas operated rifles can cause, bleeding, hematoma, broken bones and death, according the to experts on this method:

"Even on a large animal struck correctly, the dart (contraceptive PZP and GonaCon darts) can cause hemorrhage and hematoma. Misplaced shots can break bones or even kill the animal” (Thomas and Marburger 1964).

Given the longstanding unsatisfactory history of the BLM’s management of wild horses, based upon management paradigms premised on myths, made-up science, obsolete science and misinformation, any new application that is overlaid on the top of the existing paradigm can only provide flawed data output, making matters worse for the wild horses and American taxpayers.

The joint BLM-USGS press release puts a fancy wrapper on what a majority of Americans see as a failed wild horse management program, made worse by misinformation and spinning the truth. This perspective is supported by several published articles as sampled below:

1. Reno Gazette Journal: https://www.rgj.com/story/opinion/editorials/2014/03/02/failing-wild-horse-program-needs-comprehensive-review/5919211/
2. Salt Lake Tribune: https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/commentary/2020/02/12/joanna-grossman-failed/

And the mismanagement continues with the new head of the BLM Wild Horse and Burro Program, via appointment of a new Chief, Holle’ Waddell, who fails to have the necessary prerequisite hands-on experience with free-roaming wild horses.
Instead, Ms. Holle’ Waddell is dyed-in-the-wool bureaucrat with a new western makeover to make her look the part, as we see in these side-by-side photos of Ms. Waddell, before and after her appointment.


The highlights of her so-called credentials that allegedly support her appointment to the Chief of BLM’s Wild Horse and Burro program are laughable – “camping for 17-days…”

Excerpt from BLM’s bio on Ms. Waddell:

“Her experience in the Wild Horse and Burro Program is as diverse as it is encompassing. From camping out for 17 straight days in a dusty Utah desert to representing the Wild Horse and Burro Program at legislative budget meetings in Washington D.C., you might even say that Waddell has participated in pretty much every facet of the complicated management system that balances the health and safety of the wild horses and burros with the other mandated land uses the BLM is tasked with overseeing.”

However, when compared to authentic wild horse experts, Ms. Waddell doesn’t meet the mark.

The California-based 501-c-3 all-volunteer organization, ‘Wild Horse Fire Brigade’ has two researchers who have been living-among free-roaming wild horses in the mountainous wilderness on the Oregon-California border continuously for years. Michelle Gough and William E. Simpson II have compiled extensive data on the behavioral ecology and ethology of wild horses, which is the core-requisite knowledge for the intelligent management of wild horses. William has been living-among and studying wild horses going-on his 9th year in the wilderness, and has compiled over 15,000 hours of close observation, yielding new insights into the lives of American wild horses.

Let’s Look at Some Facts About the BLM:

Facts, including information published by the BLM itself, prove that the BLM is guilty of providing false and misleading information to the American public and to Congress.

Fact:
In 2018, the BLM provided a wild horse and burro management document to the Congress of the United States titled: ‘Report to Congress – Management Options for a Sustainable Wild Horse and Burro Program’
https://www.blm.gov/sites/blm.gov/files/wildhorse_2018ReporttoCongress.pdf
On page-1, paragraph 5 of that document, the BLM made the manifestly false statement that;
“Wild horses and burros have no natural predators and herds can double in size every 4 years”.
That false statement is a key premise upon which that Report is platformed.

Fact:
American wild horses evolved in North America 1.8-million years ago and every Apex predator on the continent is in fact a natural co-evolved predator of wild horses.

In a 2004 paper by Rutgers University professor Carey A. Williams, Ph.D., Extension Specialist in Equine Management, titled ‘The Basics of Equine Behavior’ we learn the unvarnished truth:
“The horse, a prey animal, depends on flight as its primary means of survival. Its natural predators are large animals such as cougars, wolves, or bears, so its ability to outrun these predators is critical.”

The BLM is also guilty of stating that North American wild horses are not a naïve species, which again, flies in the face of the latest science that fully supports the native species status of American wild horses.

One of many expert opinions that conflicts with the BLM’s tags for wild horses as; “not native’ and “invasive species” comes from Professor Ross MacPhee, courtesy of an article by the non-governmental org, In Defense of Animals:

“Evidence that Wild Horses are Native to North America
Dr. Ross MacPhee is the curator of the Division of Vertebrate Zoology at the American Museum of Natural History who has scientifically studied horse evolution for many years. He debunked the BLM’s false claim saying, “The family Equidae evolved on this continent; it is as American as anything you could possibly imagine. That was 55 million years ago. Progressive evolution occurred thereafter, eventually culminating 1.8 million years ago when a horse very like modern horses evolved… Scientifically, the BLM’s comment that The Horse did not biologically evolve on the North American continent is wrong… most people regard bison as a native species even though it has only occupied North America for the past 125,000 years.”

A Brief History of Wild Horses in North America
As horses evolved in North America, they would move back and forth across the Bering Land Bridge into Siberia during glacial periods, when the sea level would drop. From there they migrated through Asia, Europe, and Africa.
It had been thought that they mysteriously went extinct in this hemisphere almost 12,000 years ago. However, recent scientific research and archeological digs have provided a considerable body of evidence that some remnant horses did survive and continued to endure up to the time of the colonization of the Americas by Europeans. Archeological sites such as Wolf Spider Cave in Colorado, Horsethief Cave and Little Box Elder Cave in Wyoming, and Pratt Cave in Texas have provided horse bones which were radiocarbon dated to show horses lived in the western United States during the period between 8,000 years ago all the way to 1481 AD.

In addition to scientific evidence, oral histories passed down by Native American tribes, as well as cave drawings, tell the story that horses and Native American cultures co-mingled prior to European arrival.

Why is this important? Dr. MacPhee said, “There are rights that should accrue to horses as native species that they don’t have at the moment.”

The BLM’s unscientific definition of wild horses gives it license to rip apart established horse families, run foals to death from helicopters, brutally rip open the ovaries of mares through surgical sterilization, and open the door to slaughter for these iconic animals by the thousands.” (end of quoted article)

These key misrepresentations by the BLM are in fact the supporting premises for what a majority of Americans and Wild Horse Advocacy groups assert is a program of mismanagement designed to eliminate wild horses from public lands where they are in conflict with other commercial enterprises.

There is superior management plan for wild horses that offers these features:

1. More cost-effective
2. More humane
3. Holistic in scope
4. Is Nature-based
5. Has social benefits
6. Has numerous environmental benefits

That plan is called the Natural Wildfire Abatement and Forest Protection Plan, aka; Wild Horse Fire Brigade.

Learn More: https://www.WildHorseFireBrigade.org

Deb Ferns
Wild Horse Fire Brigade
+1 858-212-5762
email us here

More Wild Horses Equal Less Wildfire Fuels