Update on our petition for shade and shelter for captive wild horses and burros
Last year I had several meetings with BLM staff to bring shade to the captives at Palomino Valley Center (PVC). I hoped it would set an example for other facilities without shade as well.
BLM staff wanted to try a specific shade structure to ensure it would work for the facility. They told me there was no money in their budget to buy it. I offered to quickly raise the money for the trial shade structure to fast-track the process.
Sadly the BLM’s Washington office created a lot of red tape and delays. The window for the 2015 hot weather trial period ended.
My hopes were to have the PVC shade trial completed in 2015 so by the summer of 2016 the pens would be filled with shade structures providing relief from the hot weather and triple digit heat-waves.
In the wild, equids can move to cooler zones. In the BLM pens they are trapped.
Now it’s 2016 and summer temperatures are starting to climb. . . I hope there won’t be anymore dead wild horses in the pens this summer. Previous heat-waves have been tragic.
Please email this petition to everyone you know and ask them to sign and share it. Let’s keep the pressure on BLM to do the right thing.
After all, BLM made more than $4 billion in profit last year. Funds should be made available for BLM to purchase trial shade structures themselves right now! The least BLM could do is to provide shade to the iconic captives struggling under the pounding sun.
“BLM does have a billion-dollar problem — its livestock-grazing program. According to Taxpayers for Common Sense, the direct and indirect costs of the Federal Grazing Program may result in the loss of as much as a billion dollars to the American people — every year! Note that Kornze’s one billion-dollar wild-horse “problem” covers the lifespan of horses. So, that amount would be spread out over a period of 20 years. For the same time-frame, the Federal Grazing Program would cost the taxpayers $20 billion. The fictitious wild-horse “problem” reflects BLM’s lack of scientific integrity and its deceitful data. There is no overpopulation of mustangs except on BLM’s fraudulent spreadsheets. Reviews of BLM’s year-to-year population-estimates disclose reproductively-impossible birth-rates let alone population growth-rates. For instance, in Nevada, BLM announced that the Lava Beds burro herd grew from 40 to 350 in one year, a 775% herd-growth rate. In Oregon, BLM claimed that the famous Kiger herd grew from 21 horses to 156 horses in four years, an increase of 643%. In Wyoming, BLM declared that the Salt Wells Creek herd grew from 29 horses to 616 horses in 6 months (yes, months), a 2,024% increase. BLM’s “data” is chock-full of such preposterous growth-estimates. What is a normal herd-growth rate? About 7% or 8% a year, although some estimates peg it at 4% to 6%. As for the alleged number of wild horses held in captivity, an independent forensic audit would likely reveal many “ghost” horses — ones that exist only in BLM’s bookkeeping records. BLM is a corrupt agency. It has invented a counterfeit crisis to create a sense of urgency, gambling that Congress will be tricked into increasing its budget to “solve” a non-existent problem. Finally, wild-horse adoptions have not actually declined. The appearance of a decline is due to the reformed definition of what constitutes an “adoption.” Up until 2005, BLM counted sales-for-slaughter as “adoptions.” After 2005, only “forever-family” placements qualified. Consequently, adoption-figures seemed to decline but true adoptions continued at their historical level. However, mustangs are not homeless horses. They are wild horses that belong at home — on the range.” ~ Marybeth Devlin
“This is the cost of EXTRACTION of a wildlife species for commercial purposes paid by taxpayers. It is a fraud perpetrated on the American Public and the destruction of a National “protected” treasure.” ~ Kathleen Hayden
Protect Mustangs is a nonprofit organization who protects and preserves native and wild horses.
The head of the U.S. Bureau of Land Management says it’s time to admit his agency has a $1 billion problem.
BLM Director Neil Kornze says the administration can’t afford to wage an increasingly uphill battle to protect the ecological health of federal rangeland across the West while at the same time properly managing tens of thousands of wild horses and caring for tens of thousands more rounded up in government corals.
Kornze told The Associated Press the agency may not have done as good of a job as it could have in recent years to underscore the environmental and budgetary crisis looming in its wild horse and burro program.
His experts estimate $1 billion will be needed to care for the 46,000 wild horses and burros currently in U.S. holding facilities over their lifetime. That doesn’t include the cost of future efforts to shrink the population of the record-67,000 now roaming public lands in 10 western states.
“We’re trying to make an effort to be real clear about the challenges because they are significant,” Korzne said late Tuesday.
“We need partners coming to the table, whether it’s states or counties or others,” he said”
The 67,000 horses and burros on the range is a 15 percent increase from last year, and more than double the population that was estimated when President Nixon signed the Wild and Free Roaming Horses and Burros Act into law in 1971. The landmark legislation allows for removals but also grants the animals unique federal protection and requires they be treated humanely during and after their capture.
Korzne said his agency’s horse budget has doubled since 2009 — from $40 million to more than $80 million currently — but “the trajectory of the population has just gone up and up.” Left unchecked, the population naturally doubles every four years.
“It’s a double bind,” Korzne said. “There’s a very real impact on the range when the herds are overpopulated, but it costs us $50,000 per horse if the horse lives out its whole life in holding.”
Kornze said one of the growing problems is a dramatic drop in the private adoptions of gathered mustangs over the past decade from about 8,000 a year to 2,500 or fewer.
Critics fear BLM is exaggerating the numbers to build support for past proposals by livestock interests to slaughter the oldest mustangs that have been placed in long-term holding with little chance of being adopted.
“The BLM’s numbers are inflated estimates to fear-monger elected officials into supporting a breakdown of the 1971 law,” said Anne Novak, executive director of the California-based Protect Mustangs.
Korzne insisted the agency has no intention of allowing the slaughter of federal horses. But he said it’s considering spaying, neutering or otherwise sterilizing some animals that are on the range — something just as distasteful to most horse protection groups who argue the real answer lies in dramatic cutbacks in government-subsidized livestock grazing.
“Wild horses are present on just 12 percent of federal rangelands, which they share with livestock, and their habitat has shrunk by over 40 percent the last four decades,” said Suzanne Roy, executive director of the American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign. “The feds consider 67,000 wild horses and burros to be overpopulated, yet there are only 70,000 big horn sheep remaining in the West and they are highly endangered.”
Seen in the Washington Post https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/blm-boss-wild-horse-program-facing-future-1b-budget-crisis/2016/05/12/128ae566-18b2-11e6-971a-dadf9ab18869_story.html and going viral
Protect Mustangs is a nonprofit organization who protects and preserves native and wild horses.
The letter from the vet who inspected the WY14™. Dr. Peck D.V.M. says, “…I would grade the condition of these horses as excellent. They appeared very healthy and showed no signs of malnutrition.” and “In my years of experience, this horse holding area is the best I have seen.”
Protect Mustangs is a nonprofit organization who protects and preserves native and wild horses.
Retaliation scheme against Protect Mustangs for speaking out against sterilization and slaughter
The pro-slaughter, pro-experiment on pregnant mares, pro-sterilization, pro-pzp advocates are posing as horse advocates in the “Sinister Solutions” group on Facebook. They broadcast the BLM agenda on their Facebook page sprinkled with BLM employees. It’s like an endless biased talk show. They bash and lie about real advocates championing the rights of America’s wild horses and Facebook lets them do it.
Several members of Sinister Solutions started a new group to lead the smear against us, the WY14™ and Protect Mustangs™. They are spreading lies, bashing, bullying and harassing us. They want to hurt the March pasture board fundraiser for the Wyoming 14™ (WY14™) https://www.gofundme.com/MustangPasture3-16 and they want to hurt the wild horses.
The sinister group launched a Facebook page to find the WY14™ in their private location so they would lose their safety. Now their location has been disclosed to many pro-slaughter people. What is the real motive of the group run by BLM supporters?
Several haters and jealous people also joined the Facebook group to be part of the hate-fest. Their goal is to hurt donations for the WY14™ so the orphans of slaughter can’t pay their pasture board for March. They are trying to put them at-risk.
These online bullies are not only hoping for neglect but they are interfering in our program and work. It seems they are also threatening to cause harm. The pro-slaughter, pro-sterilization advocates are plotting to “swoop in to take them”. . . But we aren’t going to let that happen.
We have contacted the authorities. Protect Mustangs has enlisted an armed security guard for an additional $1000. per month after receiving screenshots of the stalkers plotting in the Facebook group. The WY14™ board is $2,500. Security is now $1000. and then GoFundMe/WP takes 10% combined for processing. That makes the total $3,850. per month until we can move them to a new location. I pray that’s very soon so the WY14™ can know peace again. Please donate here: https://www.gofundme.com/MustangPasture3-16
If you are hearing lies about missing horses or anything else, please call me and ask any questions. My number is 415-531-8454. You can also email us at Contact@ProtectMustangs.org All the members of the herd known as the WY14™ (14 + 2 foals) are fine and well cared for on a daily basis. Craig Downer, wildlife ecologist, will attest to that. You can read his report here.
You will remember that I spoke about the one mustang who escaped during loading from the layover sanctuary last August. His name is White Socks and he was invited to stay at Dreamcatcher for the winter. The haters and pro-slaughter people have been spreading lies to create hysteria that he was missing when we had already told supporters he was there. They even went as far as to violate copyright laws to harass and bully us. This is vicious, illegal and there’s more to it.
The WY14™ are sad that their peaceful eco-pasture has been ruined by stalkers with telephoto cameras posting smears on Facebook, spewing jealously, hatred and bad energy. The WY14™ were starting to get better after all the trauma from the BLM roundup where everyone over the age of 2 was killed at slaughter for human consumption. Now they are being persecuted again. . .
Keep in mind all this is happening when a few members of the WY14™ are going to contribute foals. These fertility-haters are spying on the pregnant mares, making false claims to animal welfare agencies and then rushing off on Facebook to spread gloom and doom about their pregnancies, calling them “rank”, “inbred”, and “ugly”, etc. This is so wrong.
Right now the WY14™ need your help to share and donate for their March pasture rent. Please help them here: https://www.gofundme.com/MustangPasture3-16 Please share often so others can help donate too. This makes a big difference.
Please keep the WY14™ in your prayers and PRAY we find the land for their permanent Eco-Sanctuary in California ASAP. This is an emergency now!
“After coming out strongly against the Feds funding $11 million for cruel population control experiments on pregnant mares, we are under attack from those who push for experiments and population control. Members of BLM support groups on Facebook have intensified their slander, online-bullying and stalking to the point of trespassing and breaking the law to further their campaign of hate. These people want to manage America’s wild horses to extinction.” –Anne Novak, Executive Director of Protect Mustangs
www.ProtectMustangs.org
Protect Mustangs is a nonprofit organization who protects and preserves native and wild horses.
Testifying to integrity of Anne Novak and Protect Mustangs’ program for wild horses including rescued Wyoming 14
February 23, 2016
To Whom It May Concern:
I have known and worked with Anne Novak since 2009
and can testify to her integrity concerning the wild horses,
and to the integrity of her non-profit organization: Protect Mustangs.
She appreciates the great importance of maintaining the
natural vigor of wild horses in the wild. This includes keeping their lineages
reproductively intact. She has valiantly exposed the
hypocrisy of those who go along with partially or fully
sterilizing unique remnant populations of wild horses,
such as the group known as the Wyoming 14, which
she rescued from kill buyers. I have visited these horses
and consider them to be like the Indian ponies whose
numbers were extremely decimated in order to undermine
the original Native American culture and more nature-oriented
and nature-respecting way of life.
Ms. Novak’s organization Protect Mustangs
has courageously exposed the serious detriments of PZP administrations
on wild horse individuals and herds by citing and explaining scientific
investigations and publications that factually call these into question.
Also, she has currently exposed BLM’s plans to fund population control
experiments on pregnant mares and other wild horses, such as GonaCon™
and various methods of surgical sterilization. These are very much contrary
to the Wild Free-Roaming Horse and Burro Act.
I have been involved with the Wyoming 14 project since it’s
inception and have earlier observed and photographed these wild
horses and advised Protect Mustangs on their condition and care.
I recommend that they be genetically tested in order to document their
unique heritage and to support their future protection.
I hope that they and their descendants can be reintroduced
into the wild in or near the area from which they were so thoughtlessly
removed. This would help restore the great
herds in this ecosystem where they possess generations
of natural adaptation. As an ecologist, generations of natural adaptation
is something I very much value and defend.
Finally, I would like to add that I have worked positively
with Anne Novak and her organization Protect Mustangs
and continue to do so at present. Contrary to rumors, there
is no “falling out” between us and I look forward to working
with Protect Mustangs to restore true integrity to our great
nation’s wild horse and burro program. This signifies restoring
the legal herds in their legal herd areas (BLM) and territories
(US Forest Service) as reproductively intact populations
at truly long-term viable levels and with minimal interference,
as accords with the basic mandate of the law. To this end and
as a professional wildlife ecologist, I am proposing a Reserve
Design approach that will also result in naturally self-stabilizing
population in the wild, free from gruesome chemical or surgical tampering.
This will truly obey the core mandate of the Wild Free-
Roaming Horses and Burros Act (contact me for more information).
I know that Anne Novak and her organization Protect Mustangs share
this wonderful and caring vision for the wild horses and burros with me.
Sincerely,
Craig C. Downer
Wildlife Ecologist
President: Andean Tapir Fund/Wild Horse and Burro Fund
P.O. Box 456
Minden, NV 89423
WY14 grazing for the first time since the slaughter-bound roundup
Contact Anne Novak at 415-531-8454 or by email via Contact@ProtectMustangs.org if you would like to help create the Wild Horse Eco-Sanctuary for education and outreach close to San Francisco. This will be the permanent home for the WY14, Blondie, Tibet, Lennox, Amore, Sol & Val
Below are some photos of the group of wild horses known as the WY14–wild horses rescued back from the slaughterhouse in 2014 by Mark Boone Junior and Anne Novak.
WY14 grazing for the first time since the slaughter-bound roundup
Ghost Dancer arrives in California
Below are the Wild Horse Ambassadors who will have close contact with people at the Eco-Sanctuary
Amore was recently rescued front he Oklahoma kill pen. She was a riding horse.
Lennox was rescued from the Fort Mc Dermitt roundup and slaughter auction in Fallon, Nevada in 2013
Tibet and Blondie were both yearlings facing their 3rd Strike and were saved
March 4, 2013
March 3, 2013
Blondie & Brownie at BLM Litchfield corral with Sept. 2012
Val and Sol are from the Twin Peaks HMA and were saved as weanlings when BLM was selling truckloads of wild horses to kill buyers. Some scoundrels were collecting young ones to live ship for foal sashimi in Asia.
www.ProtectMustangs.org
Protect Mustangs is a nonprofit organization who protects and preserves native and wild horses.
We are grateful our sucessful legal actions have stopped roundups and saved thousands of lives in the Pine Nut and Fort McDemitt areas. Protect Mustangs is creating a legal team to continue the fight for wild horse freedom in the courts. We almost didn’t find lawyers in time to help save the Pine Nut herd. We need to hire a staff lawyer
The team at Protect Mustangs feels legal action is a very important area of focus with a huge impact to save many lives.
Did you know that Academy Award-winner Michael Blake (Dances with Wolves), RIP, joined our Fort McDermitt lawsuit in 2013 to help stop two years of horrible roundups that were sending wild horses to slaughter?
Michael Blake wins Oscar for writing Dances with Wolves This is what Michael Blake wrote on August 21, 2013:
I, Michael Lennox Blake, declare and state as follows:
1. I am an author as well as a screenwriter. I have written several books and screenplays including Dances with Wolves, which was released to international acclaim in 1990. In 1991, I won every major award for my screenplay for Dances with Wolves, including an Academy Award, Golden Globe, Writer’s Guild Award, and the Silver Spur. I have also received public service awards including the Eleanor Roosevelt Award and the Americanism Award, in addition to many other awards during my life.
2. I reside in Sonoita, Arizona. I am a member of Protect Mustangs, and also am on the Advisory Board for Protect Mustangs. In a professional capacity I am an author and screenwriter. I support the work that Protect Mustangs does to protect wild horses and advocate for effective wild horse conservation on public lands.
3. I have visited Nevada for decades to see the wild horses, study them, and be inspired by them for my work. I have explored the lands of Nevada where the wild horses roam in freedom for inspiration and research for my work. I intend to return to these areas so I may continue to be inspired and do research for my work.
4. In 1992, I helped commission the first comprehensive aerial census of wild horses in Nevada. In almost every herd area, the horses were far less numerous than the BLM estimated. The final count in our survey was 8,324.
5. Protect Mustangs’ members are interested in wild horses, and I support their work to protect wild horses’ freedom and safety from cruel and harmful practices including but not limited to illegal roundups. Their mission is to educate the public about indigenous wild horses, protect and research American wild horses on the range, and help those who have lost their freedom. Protect Mustangs works to educate the public about the decisions and activities of the government that impact wild horses, and find solutions for wild horse conservation that does not include roundups and auctioning off wild horses for slaughter. Members of the public and horse advocates across the United States are interested in and support Protect Mustangs’ work to protect wild horses due to their recreational, scientific, spiritual, ecological, cultural, artistic, historical, iconic, and aesthetic values.
6. I wrote in my book Twelve the King:
“But he and hundreds of thousand like him are gone now from this beautiful land, and for that reason alone I could not stop as I traveled over four hundred miles of Nevada roads. Something evil is still afoot in this land, and it has left its imprint everywhere. In all those miles of open, free country, the mark of evil is present in what is absent. The wild horses are missing from the land.”
7. I have written extensively about the American West and find inspiration seeing and studying wild horses. If these unbranded, wild horses are rounded up and removed by the USDA Forest Service and/or the BLM on tribal land, or elsewhere by the Forest Service and/or the BLM, I will be harmed because I will no longer have the ability to study them or be inspired for my books, stories and other works.
8. Wild horses and their connection with the land in the American West inspire me to write. I have plans to spend time in the future using and enjoying these lands and studying free-roaming wild horses on public lands in the Owyhee HMAs and where the wild horses roam in the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest, as well as on tribal lands. The proposed gather on USDA Forest Service and tribal lands will forever remove wild and free-roaming horses that I rely upon in my professional and personal capabilities.
9. I derive significant satisfaction and happiness from the existence of native wild, free- roaming horses. Ensuring the continued existence and distribution of wildlife including wild horses in the West is of the utmost importance to me and has directly influenced my life a great deal. The West is far different than the East because the West still has wildlife—including wild horses that inspire me to write fiction and non-fiction.
10. If the Fort McDermitt Horse Gather proceeds as planned, it will prevent me and other members of Protect Mustangs from recreating, enjoying, studying, being inspired from, and writing about the wild horses in the area in the future. I am very unlikely to continue deriving benefit and inspiration concerning the wild horses in an area where they have been removed and herd numbers drastically reduced as is proposed by the Fort McDermitt Horse Gather and the 2013 Agreement between the Forest Service and Fort McDermitt Tribal Council. Our members share these views as well.
11. I have been studying and gaining inspiration from seeing wild horses in Nevada throughout my life. I have certain plans to continue visiting these wild areas of Nevada authorized for roundup, including the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest, throughout my lifetime. For the aforementioned reasons I would be directly harmed should the unbranded, wild horses at issue in the Fort McDermitt Horse Gather be removed and the horses rounded up and be allowed to go to holding, auction, sale, or slaughter.
[End of Michael Lennox Blake’s declaration]
HELP build the legal fund today so Protect Mustangs can continue to fight for wild horses in court. We are a unique group dedicated purely to the protection and preservation of America’s wild horses. We need to act quickly and independently to HELP SAVE wild horses with legal action. Please make a donation today and share this fundraiser: https://www.gofundme.com/MustangLaw2016 or donate via PayPal to Contact@ProtectMustangs.org
