Take Action TODAY: Protect Wild Horses in Wyoming's Red Desert Complex

American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign

Wild horses in Red Desert, Wyoming

The Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is accepting public comments for a scoping period for the “Proposed Wild Horse Gather” for the Red Desert Complex in Wyoming. During the scoping period, which ends on March 28, 2011, the public can raise issues and suggest alternatives to be considered in the environmental analysis and final plan for the horse-capturing action.

In this case, the scoping notice portrays the action as a Catch, Treat and Release (CTR) plan for administration of fertility control. However, AWHPC has learned that the plan also includes the removal of approximately 500-650 horses living within and outside of the Complex. This large mustang removal will take place less than a year after BLM's Adobe Town and Salt Wells Creek roundup, which removed over 2,000 wild horses from another region of Wyoming's famed Red Desert.

This is an historically significant wild horse population; many of the mustangs have genetic markers that link them directly to the Spanish colonial and other New World Iberian breeds that distinguish them from domestic horse breeds.

Yet, instead of preserving these unique horses, the BLM has systematically reduced their habitat and their numbers to dangerously low population levels.

While AWHPC supports safe and proven fertility control methods for managing wild horses on the range, we oppose the proposed removal of approximately 200-250 yearlings, foals and other horses from within the Complex and the removal of approximately 300-400 horses outside of the Complex

Please get your comments in by March 28th to request that alternatives for avoiding the removals of horses be included in the Environmental Assessment and the final action plan.

Please personalize the letter below by adding your own comments. Be sure to include your mailing address so that the BLM does not have an excuse to dismiss your comments. Thank you for continuing to take action to protect wild horses and burros.

CLICK HERE to TAKE ACTION!