According to a press release from National Academy of Sciences released June 5, 2013, “The U.S. Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) current practice of removing free-ranging horses from public lands promotes a high population growth rate, and maintaining them in long-term holding facilities is both economically unsustainable and incongruent with public expectations, says a new report by the National Research Council.”
The NAS report states there is “no evidence” of overpopulation. Only tobacco science and spin backs up BLM’s population claim to justify roundups and fertility control/sterilizations.
We request an immediate moratorium on roundups for scientific population studies.
Wild horses are a returned-native species to America. Rounding up federally protected wild horses and burros has been documented as cruel. Warehousing them for decades is fiscally irresponsible. Clearing mustangs and burros off public land–for industrialization, fracking, grazing and the water grab–goes against the 1971 Free Roaming Wild Horse and Burro Act put in place to protect the living legends of the American West. They must never go to slaughter.
We request you defund and stop the roundups immediatly.
There is no accurate census and the BLM figures do not add up. We request population studies for each herd management area (HMA) and each herd area (HA) because we are gravely concerned there are less than 18,000 wild horses and burros in the 10 western states combined. More roundups or fertility control/sterilizations will wipe them out because the majority are no longer genticaly viable herds.
Wild horses are not overpopulating despite spin from the forces that want to perform heinous sterilizations in the field. Humane fertility control could be looked at as an option only after scientific population studies have been conducted for each HMA and each HA. Right now it’s premature.
Field observers have noticed a worrisome decline in wild horse and burro population since the BLM’s rampant roundups from 2009 to this day.
Kindly allow returned-native wild horses and the burros to reverse desertification, reduce the fuel for wildfires and create biodiversity on public land–while living with their families in freedom.
Call & email your Senators & Reps to get their help on this federal issue! Captured wild horses & burros need shade. Contact info here:http://www.usa.gov/Contact/Elected.shtml
We have spoken with a Nevada BLM facility manager who said shade structures need to be authorized from the national level of the Bureau of Land Management in Washington, D.C. So let’s make our voices heard!
We are working with Senator Mark Manendo who is deeply concerned. Anne Novak & Mark Manendo called offices in Washington today.
Palomino Valley is installing temporary sprinklers now thanks to public outrage and awesome advocate work on the “Gimme Shelter” campaign but that’s not shade. Keep pushing the “Gimme Shelter” campaign. Wild horses & burros need shade in a heat wave!
Donate for gas to document wild horses in holding. We will volunteer our time but need your help to put gas in the tank. ($4.11 a gal here). Send via PayPal to Contact@ProtectMustangs.org Thank you for helping us help them!
If you live outside the USA send us an email and we will bring those to our meetings with elected officials. Email: Contact@ProtectMustangs.org
SAN FRANCISCO (December 20, 2012)–Citizens around the word are outraged at the BLM’s cruelty towards America’s native wild horses. The alleged federally protected mustangs are being rounded up and removed by the thousands only to be stockpiled in the Midwest at taxpayer expense. Some end up in the slaughter pipeline. During the current Owyhee roundup wild horse advocates documented mustangs being chased by a helicopter through barbed wire fencing. Protect Mustangs wants the roundups to stop and for the government to use the wild herds in Holistic Rangeland Management instead to reverse desertification on public land.
Artist Michelle Guillot says she was inspired by the horrific scenes of wild horses being driven through barbed wire at the Owyhee Roundup in Nevada.
“I was so appalled that I had to do something!” states Guillot. “How can the government hire helicopter contractors to push mustangs into barbed wire?”
She made the Seasons Greeting poster to let the world know what’s going on. Protect Mustangs is grateful to be able to release Guillot’s powerful message.
Public outrage is mounting and as a result, Protect Mustangs is organizing a Rally in San Francisco for January 2013. Date, time and place to be announced.
“The cruel roundups must stop,” states Anne Novak, executive director of Protect Mustangs. “Congress needs to listen to the public. They must stop enabling the wild horse wipe out–even if lobbyists are throwing cash around Washington.”
Protect Mustangs encourages Americans to meet with their senators and representatives to ask them to stop the roundups and use wild equids with livestock for Holistic Rangeland Management. This is a powerful solution for climate change–one that will reverse desertification.
The Petition to Defund and Stop the Roundups is circulating. Animal lovers around the world are encouraged to share it with their friends and request the United States Congress stop the cruelty and stop the roundups.
Michelle Guillot retains the copyright to the poster but encourages animal lovers to share the poster to spread awareness. She does not want the poster used for fundraising or commercial use.
Protect Mustangs is a California-based preservation group whose mission is to educate the public about the American wild horse, protect and research wild horses on the range and help those who have lost their freedom.
Wild horses are indigenous to North America. They will heal the land while creating biodiversity to balance out the surge of grazing, energy, mining and water projects on public land.
We understand your priority to foster the New Energy Frontier and therefore we ask you to find the win-win so America’s wild horses and burros–our living treasures–will not become extinct from the industrialization of western public lands.
It’s essential to leave viable herds (families) on public land so the wind horses and burros can reverse desertification because of their nature to forage and roam.
Predators will control the population as part of nature’s cycle and only the fittest will survive. This cuts out the cost of buying costly pharmaceuticals to control reproduction.
We know all the 51,000 wild horses in holding are at risk of going to slaughter and ask that they be returned to public land where they will cost the government almost nothing to live out their lives. Most male horses in holding have already been sterilized so they will not be able to reproduce.
We oppose creating additional herds of sterile wild horses as they don’t exhibit wild horse behaviors and could threaten the indigenous horse with extinction.
We stand with thousands of Americans to respectfully ask you to stop the cruel wild horse and burro roundups, so that an accurate accounting of horses on the range can take place and alternative sustainable management techniques could be applied to save the indigenous horse.
We thank you in advance for becoming a hero for America’s indigenous horses.
Robin Warren leads youth campaign for Protect Mustangs
For immediate release:
SAN FRANCISCO, Ca. (July 16, 2012)–Since joining Protect Mustangs in June as their new youth campaign director, Robin Warren, age 11, has met with a Nevada State Senator, documented wild horses on the range, was a featured speaker at the Stop the Roundups rally in California’s capital and gave oral comments at the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) helicopter hearing also in the golden state. At the hearing, Warren presented the BLM representative with her Petition to Save Wild Mustangs asking the BLM to stop helicopter roundups.
“It’s not fair that the Bureau of Land Management has an exemption to the law that protects wild horses and burros,” states Robin Warren, youth campaign director for Protect Mustangs. “We want cruel helicopter roundups to stop and we want to make sure they always have access to clean water.”
The petition reads:
“We, the undersigned, do respectfully request that the Bureau of Land Management adhere to the same rules and regulations as the general public in regards to the humane treatment of wild horses and burros. We find it unreasonable that the Secretary of the Interior, the Bureau of Land Management, or any person or organization, is found to be exempt from our collective responsibility as humans to treat animals humanely. We further find it unreasonable that the Secretaries of the Interior and Agriculture are permitted to define “humane” as it pertains to their own areas of command. We respectfully request that the Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971 be restored to its original intent, that no person or organization would be permitted to capture wild horses and burros by means of motorized vehicles, or by polluting or closing off watering holes, as these methods have been proven inhumane.”
Warren started the petition 3 years ago under her pen name Wild Mustang Robin–to stop the wild horse roundups. She was inspired to co-author the petition after reading “Mustang, Wild Spirit of the West” by Marguerite Henry.
She has been active in her hometown, Las Vegas, and over the internet to get signatures. After posting the petition online at Change.org she received signatures from 50 States, DC, Puerto Rico & and more than 30 countries.
At last week’s helicopter use hearing in Sacramento, Warren presented 2770 signatures from her petition to Amy Dumas, the BLM representative.”Kids don’t want to see wild horses in zoos,” states Warren. “We want to observe them roaming on the open range with their families.”
Warren’s speech at the BLM helicopter use hearing received a standing ovation from the audience.
“Robin speaks for the youth of America and touches people’s hearts across the nation,” says Anne Novak, executive director for Protect Mustangs. “She wants the wild horses to be protected–not harassed and torn from their families forever.”
Copy of Robin’s speech to BLM delivered as a letter at the hearing:
Robin Warren Director of the Youth Program Protect Mustangs P.O. Box 5661 Berkley, CA 94705
Mike Pool
Acting Director of the Bureau of Land Management
1849 C Street NW, Rm. 5665
Washington DC 20240
James G. Kenna & Amy Dumas
BLM Wild Horse and Burro State Director, and Program
California State Office
2800 Cottage Way, Suite W1834
Sacramento, CA 95825
July 10th, 2012
Re: Helicopter Roundups
Dear Messrs. Mike Pool and James Kenna and Ms. Amy Dumas;
Hi I am Wild Mustang Robin, Director of the Youth Campaign at Protect Mustangs; I came here today to talk about the mustangs. I am happy see there are many people here who could come today to say no to the roundups. First of all I would like to say the roundups are inhumane. There is a law made by Wild Horse Annie saying you cannot use motorized vehicles to round up the wild horses. If I – or even the President – was to round them up I would get arrested. Now there is one interesting thing: the BLM gets an exemption even though it is a law not to use motorized vehicles.
Helicopters are like monsters to the mustangs; children do not want America’s animals to be scared or hurt in anyway. This makes kids feel unsafe because they don’t want to have monsters in their life and children are like animals (they don’t have a voice really). The helicopters are so scary that the mustangs remember the noise for the rest of their lives. I went to the BLM holding facility in Sparks, NV and when we were walking a slow pace the horses got scared and ran away. They were scared of people walking – how do you think they feel about helicopters?
Another reason the roundups are inhumane is because they separate the families apart – the foals from the mothers and the mothers from the fathers. They might spend the rest of their lives behind gates and never see each other again. Their ability to have families is a gift because many creatures have to let their babies live on their own after a few weeks of them taking care of them. I know how it feels because I lost my whole family. I have found a new home and happiness but the mustangs may never get to be in a herd again – and they long for family. It is not humane to separate families from each other. How would you feel if you lost your family?
A much more humane idea is to keep the family bands whole and send them all together to sanctuaries. It is an idea that would save money and make money as a tourist attraction – a business like a hotel near where the mustangs and burros live. This is a great idea and it can cost less than feeding, watering, and taking care of them when they can take care of themselves. It could make money for all the states where mustangs still live – both yours and mine.
The mustangs and burros deserve to be treated right. I know that and a numerous amount of others do too. Many people care about the wild horses and burros and do not want any of them rounded up or eaten. There are the big names you know, that spoke before me, and then there are the “little names” you don’t know yet, like mine. I represent the voices of many children.
Please do not use helicopters or motorized vehicles for roundups or management. Please reconsider your roundup plans and let them live in freedom.
We were looking for an article about the Sacramento protest, where more than 25 dedicated advocates from around the West endured 104 degrees in front of the Federal Courthouse to stand up against roundups. Sadly only a fluff piece was published that belittled public outrage over cruel roundups.
BLM California’s Amy Dumas is quoted as saying “most people who protest roundups don’t understand them”.
” . . . Until last fall, all of the horses were living in the wild, according to Amy Dumas, manager of the wild horse program for BLM in California.
She said they had been gathered in a round-up, a BLM tactic used to maintain the growing population of wild horses. She likened the process to a helicopter acting as a sheepdog and herding horses into pens.
Roundups are controversial – on Tuesday, about 15 people from throughout California and Nevada protested BLM’s roundup program outside of Sacramento’s federal courthouse. The protestors said horses are a national symbol of freedom that deserve to stay in the wild and roundups are abusive.
Dumas said most people who protest roundups don’t understand them. Beverly Moss, who attended Saturday’s event with family members, agreed and said she has watched a BLM roundup.
“I did not see abuse at all,” she said. “I felt like they really cared about the horses.”
BLM Helicopter Hearing, July 10th, 2012 at 6:30 at the Woodlake Hotel in Sacramento, CA
I got there just on time after we drove in a couple circles and got lost. Luckily another horse advocate gave us directions to which room it was in because it was hard to find. My mom signed us both in and then we got our seats in the front row. Everyone was talking and laughing except the BLM employees.
The BLM employee who was running the meeting was kind of mean – she would distract you while you were speaking so it was harder to say what you wanted to say. She said everyone had only 3 minutes to speak because there were so many people and she wanted to give everyone a turn. They way that it was distracting was because she had the warning times on paper and she would wave as each speakers time ran out. There 4 signs: 1 minutes, 30 seconds, 15 seconds, and STOP. When the speakers saw it sometimes they lost their train of thought but then others would volunteer to give up their time so each speaker could say everything they wanted to say.
Cat Kindsfather gave me her time because she didn’t want me interrupted. I zoned out the timekeeper so I could say everything I wanted to. I knew it would be around 3 minutes so I wasn’t really worried but I guess I did get into extra time because I heard someone say “Stop doing that to her! She can have my time!”
Cat took lots of pictures.
When I got up to speak everyone clapped and was very encouraging. Then I read my comments. Near the end everyone clapped but I had one more thing to say. I wanted to tell the BLM how many signatures I had gotten since the last time I presented signatures. I said “In January I presented 1,200 signatures and now I have 1,000 more. And I want to get – no I did get – 10 more today! I won’t stop until they listen and stop hurting the mustangs. Please stop the helicopter roundups!”
The other speakers were really great. I learned some things. The author, Terri Farley, told me that her Phantom Stallion series have sold 2 million copies so I am speaking for maybe more children than I realize.
I was sad most of the time about what the speakers were saying. Simone Netherlands described a roundup that I heard about my first year of the petition but hearing about it again was upsetting. Two foals had to be put down after their hooves fell off from being chased by the helicopter. They suffered for days before they were put down.
The mood was elevated. Everyone in the room except for the 4 BLM employees (2 administrators and 2 armed guards) was on our side. They want the roundups stopped. But one speaker, toward the end was discouraging because she reminded us that we probably won’t get heard. That we shouldn’t be happy. That we’ve all already said NO to the roundups and that the BLM will not listen!
But I think we will be heard. I think it was a great meeting of supporters and that it will spark a bigger movement.
I was surprised to find out that many people don’t know what is happening to the horses. I want to tell the world. I didn’t know either until I read the book “Mustang – Wild Spirit of the West” by Marguerite Henry. It is written for a younger audience so it is a quick read for any adult who want to be educated about wild horses. We need to spread the word so we can save the horses!
Sincerely,
Robin Warren (Wild Mustang Robin)
Youth Campaign Director for Protect Mustangs
Mustang Robin hands Amy Dumas (BLM) the growing petition against helicopter roundups at the California BLM public hearing on helicopters in Sacramento July 10, 2012
Stop the Roundups Rally, July 10, 2012, at 2 p.m. Federal Courthouse, 501 I Street, Sacramento, Ca.
We got there a half hour early to meet with two other horse advocates: Debby Coffey and Garnet Pasquel. They were very nice. Garnet gave me a button and they both signed my petition. We had brought signs from Las Vegas for American Wild Horse Advocates since Garnet flew and we were driving. Everyone liked the signs we brought.
After we had refreshments we went across the street to set up. A lot of people came to help and a lot of people brought signs. People really liked mine that said “Helicopters are Monsters”. The spectators also liked the one that said “Honk for Horses” because they kept honking. News reporters came and took pictures and video. – people from the TV and the newspaper. One reporter asked me some questions. They said they were only going to take a few pictures but once they saw all the people who came they stayed a while longer and took many more pictures.
It was about 45 minutes before the master of ceremonies, Jetara True-Love, started introducing the speakers. Many great speakers spoke before me. My favorite was Craig Downer who spoke first because he had a lot of information. But it is not right for me to choose a favorite because I enjoyed every speaker.
I am so grateful that wild horse hero, Anne Novak, chose me to be the Director of the Youth Campaign for Protect Mustangs. There could be no greater honor. I am so happy that this happened because I thought I would always be in the background but now I am in the front with all the rest of the horse heroes. Another member on the Board of Directors of Protect Mustangs is photographer Cat Kindfather and she is also a hero of mine. Both Anne and Cat are so encouraging to me. I’m really looking forward to letting other kids know about the wild horses & burros so they can help too.
I felt like I was in Hollywood because I got to meet so many horse celebrities – my heroes. I got to close the rally with my speech. The microphone stopped working but everyone got close to hear me. When I was done, everyone was cheering for me.
The rally ended but not many people left right away. We all wanted to stay and talk. Many of us stayed together after the rally until the hearing, exchanging information, and encouraging each other. Even though it was hot and a little longer than I expected I had the time of my life. And, as everyone noted, the a few hours in the heat is nothing compared to what our wild horses are put through. I will never forget this day. I hope we made a difference for the horses. I hope everyone keeps rallying everywhere until the horses are once again free!
The Sacramento Stop the Roundups Rally and Press Conference is at 2 p.m. July 10th on the sidewalk outside the Federal Courthouse across from the Amtrak station. ( 501 ” I ” Street at the 5th Street intersection in Sacramento, CA 95814)
Here is a list of speakers:
Carla Bowers, National Wild Horse Advocate
Tina Brodrick, Owner of Sonny Boys Tours
Craig Downer, Wildlife Biologist and acclaimed Wild Horse and Burro Expert
Terri Farley, Award winning writer and beloved author of The Phantom Stallion series
Cat Kindsfather, Award winning wild horse photographer
Marilyn Kroplick, MD, Board President for In Defense of Animals
Simone Netherlands, President of Respect for Horses
Anne Novak, Executive Director of Protect Mustangs
Jetara Séhart, Executive Director of Native Wild Horse Protection & Marin Mustangs
Robin Warren (Wild Mustang Robin), Director of The Youth Campaign for Protect Mustangs
Bring homemade signs and your friends. It will be hot so bring a rain umbrella for shade and plenty of water. Protect Mustangs encourages members of the public to carpool or take Amtrak to save on fuel and reduce pollution. Oil and gas extraction–on public land–is one of the main reasons wild horses are being wiped off their home on the range. Be part of the solution and take the train if you can.
The voiceless wild horses and burros need your help after the rally too. Give oral or written comment against helicopter roundups and attend the 6:30 pm BLM Wild Horse & Burro Helicopter/Vehicle Use Public Hearing for roundups and management. The meeting runs from 6:30-8:30 PM at the Woodlake Hotel (formerly the Radisson near Arden Fair Mall) 500 Leisure Lane in Sacramento.
Please CALL the Capitol switchboard today at (202) 224-3121. Ask to be connected to your state Representative’s office. Ask them to NOT fund helicopter roundups.
