Dr Friedlander, DVM, visits wild horses in the wild (Photo © Irma Novak, all rights reserved)

“I’d like to know, where are all the wild horses?” ~Dr. Lester Castro Friedlander, DVM. 

Below is an excerpt from Dr. Friedlander’s comments today at The Wild Horse & Burro Advisory Board Meeting in Arlington, Virginia.

“I just returned from an extensive trip to observe wild horses in their natural environment as well as in captivity. After traveling hundreds of miles in California and Nevada on the Twin Peaks and Pine Nut ranges, I’d like to know what all the overpopulation hype is about? I only saw one band of 4 horses, including 1 foal in the Pine Nuts range and 10 wild horses in the Twin Peaks 800,000 acre range. Out of the 10 wild horses I saw only 2 that were foals.

. . .  I am here today to call for an immediate moratorium on all wild horse and burro roundups so the government will conduct population studies on each herd management area in the West.

We need population evidence, not sketchy population data and not skewed birthrate statistics showing a species fearing extinction and thus reproducing to prevent extinction. The National Academy of Sciences report shows “no evidence” to justify BLM’s overpopulation claims. It’s time for real science and real data . . . ”