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a wild horse friendship photo by Carrol Abel
Bureau of Land Management's scheduled removal of roughly 2,700 wild horses from the Calico Complex in Northern Nevada may not go as the agency had planned. A lawsuit filed Monday in Federal U.S. District court for the District of Columbia seeks to prevent the roundup from occurring. In Defense of Animals, an international animal protection organization, and noted ecologist Craig Downer have enlisted the office of Buchanan, Ingersoll & Rooney who will be representing them on a pro bono basis.
"This suit aims to halt the inherent cruelty of the BLM's wild horse roundups, which traumatize, injure and kill horses, subvert the will of Congress and are entirely illegal." says William Spriggs, lead counsel for IDA and Mr. Downer.
An environmental assessment of the BLM proposal was released in October. The assessment is based on removal of between 2,476 and 2,787 wild horses from a five herd management Complex which they estimate has a current population of 3,095 horses. After removal, the animals will be branded then join around 32,000 wild horses already in BLM holding facilities. According to a BLM official, the Winnemucca District office logged over 7,000 responses in the first three weeks of time allotted for public comments.
The suit alleges that such a proposal violates the 1971 Wild and Free Roaming Horse And Burro Act which states specifically, "(wild horses and burros) shall be protected from capture, branding, harassment or death..." Congress set aside 59 million acres to be used primarily for their welfare. " Since 1971, BLM has removed over 270,000 horses... and taken away nearly 20 million acres of wild horse habitat..." says the IDS website. "The policy is based on the unsupportable claim that Western ranges cannot sustain wild horses and burros... an estimated 8 million livestock, but only 37,000 horses and burros, graze on public lands."
Americans strongly support protecting wild horses on their natural ranges in the West." said Mr. Spriggs, "We hope to stop the cruel roundups and mass stockpiling of wild horses and burros in government holding facilities while the Obama administration crafts a new policy that protects these animals and upholds the will of congress and the public desire to preserve this important part of our national heritage."
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