A feral horse management plan for herd management areas (HMA) in the Red Desert area of Wyoming has drawn ire from environmentalist and horse advocacy groups, who claim the plan will result in the largest-ever eradication of wild horses and their habitat. The plan would reduce the population of wild horses in the state by about one-third.
Record of decision
The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) published a wild horse management plan for the BLM Rock Springs and Rawlins field offices in May. The offices have historically managed horses within four HMAs on checkerboard land, which covers more than 2.8 million acres. Since private lands are included in the HMAs, consent from the landowners is necessary for BLM to be able to manage the horses.
The Rock Springs Grazing Association owns a large portion of private land within the checkboard land and revoked their consent in 2010 to allow up to 500 wild horses on the land. The group also requested for all wild horses to be removed. No other private landowners within the HMAs have consented to allow wild horses to use their land.
“Because private land was included when establishing these HMAs and their associated (appropriate management levels, AMLs), this change in consent for the use of private lands within the checkerboard portion of these HMAs has made it necessary for BLM to reevaluate the (herd areas) on which these HMAs are based to determine if it is still appropriate to manage wild horses in these areas, and to establish a suitable AML,” the record of decision read.
BLM wrote in the decision that managing wild horses in the checkboard portion of the planning area has become more challenging due to the private land conflict. BLM noted it typically does not reduce wild horse populations below AMLs except in emergency situations, as directed by the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971, but the agency is also required to remove horses from private land when it is requested.
“This dual mandate is difficult to implement in the checkerboard where every other section of land is private, and wild horses constantly drift between private and public land,” the agency wrote. “Removing all wild horses that are on private land, or have the potential to stray onto private land, could cause the wild horse population to fall below low AML.”
Proposed plan
BLM chose a management plan alternative that would address the private land conflicts and reduce the AMLs for the HMAs.
The proposal would change the status of two HMAs to HAs, which would remove all wild horses on the HMAs; reduce the size of a third HMA by about half and authorize an AML up to 536; and keep the fourth HMA at an AML of 205-300. BLM would implement population growth suppression strategies on the fourth HMA. The plan would reduce the habitat area by about 2.1 million acres.
“In areas where wild horses are permanently removed, (animal unit months) previously allocated to wild horse use could, in the future, be allocated to wildlife, livestock or other ecosystem functions,” BLM said. This will be determined in the future based on further National Environmental Policy Act analysis.
Lawsuit
The American Wild Horse Campaign (AWHC), Animal Welfare Institute (AWI), Western Watersheds Project and three private citizens filed suit on May 10 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Wyoming against the Department of the Interior.
“The decision threatens to undermine federal protections for wild horses across the West by setting a dangerous precedent for private landowners to dictate whether federally protected wild horses will be allowed to live in their designated habitats on public lands,” said William S. Eubanks II of Eubanks and Associates, which filed the protest on behalf of the groups.
The groups allege that BLM is removing wild horses and their habitat because they “pose an inconvenience to the BLM and private ranchers.” — Anna Miller, WLJ managing editor
