Adopt a Wild Horse and Receive $1,000: A Controversial Solution to Overpopulation

Federal land managers are offering $1,000 for each wild horse adopted, aiming to reduce the number of animals in captivity. This initiative comes amid controversial discussions about euthanasia and unrestricted sales of wild horses and burros.

Federal land managers are so desperate to reduce the staggering number of wild horses held in permanent captivity they will pay $1,000 for every horse you adopt, as long as you promise to provide a good home.

At the same time, the Bureau of Land Management is considering acontroversial option that calls for the “unrestricted sale”of up to 110,000 horses and burros and euthanizing another 24,000 over the next decade, even thoughCongressfrowns upon killing healthy equines or selling them for slaughter.

These were some of the ideas aired this week by theBLM’swild horse advisory board, which convenes annually to craft recommendations for addressing the proliferation of wild horses on the West’spublic lands, including in Utah.

ActingBLMDirector Brian Steed told the panel, gathered at a Salt Lake City hotel, that the time for deciding on solutions is long past and congressional action will likely be needed to either provide more money to warehouse horses or authorize lethal measures.

The agency has been under fire by both sides in the horse debate. Everyone agrees the current course is not only expensive and unsustainable, but also cruel to the animals and hard on the land. Speaker after speaker said years of inaction has resulted in “an ecological train wreck.”

Yet consensus onsolutionsis nowhere in sight.

Modern horses and burros have been protected under federal law since 1971 because these animals, mostly descended from domestic horses turned loose by Spanish explorers and Anglo pioneers, are viewed as “living symbols of the historic and pioneer spirit of the West.”

While free-roaming horses have inspired a generation of animal lovers, they are in conflict with ranchers, who blame them for deteriorating range conditions.

For yearsBLMhas relied on a policy ofremoving “excess” animalsfrom the range, administeringfertility control, and finding new homes for some, while putting the rest in permanent captivity.

Pasturing a horse costs about $5 a day, resulting in an annual $50 million bill to U.S. taxpayers that just gets bigger each year. Given these costs, a $1,000 adoption incentive is a bargain, according to Holle’ Waddell, who oversees theBLM’s off-range holding program. Adopters will get two payments in the program that will roll out this fall.

“One of $500 at the time of adoption, and $500 at the time of title date," Waddell said. “We like to encourage new individuals and organizations that are not currently purchasing to come out.”

Even without the incentive, adoptions have been increasing, reaching 4,600 last year. But that number is far less than the 11,000 scheduled for removal from the range this year.

Two years ago, the advisory board recommended theBLM“offer all suitable animals in long- and short-term holding deemed unadoptable for sale without limitation or humane euthanasia.” However, public opinion weighs heavily against killing healthy horses andCongressrestricts slaughter sales, so theBLMhas so far refrained.

In the time since, the on-range horse population has grown from 67,000 to 82,000, even as theBLM accelerated removals last year.

Ranchers who grazepublic landswant horse numbers reduced to what the law calls “appropriate management levels,” for theBLM’s various herd management areas, through roundups, lethal measures, and surgical sterilization of horses returned to the range.

Horse advocates want theBLMto abandon those management levels, which they say were arbitrarily set to 1971 population levels when federal horse-protection laws were enacted. They insist theBLMshould order ranchers to reduce stocking levels and prioritize designated horse and burros areas for free-roaming equines.

The American Wild Horse Conservation (formerly American Wild Horse Campaign) delivereda petition signed by 250,000 people, demanding suspension ofroundups, alleging they inhumanely traumatize horses and are not necessary.

Ranchers and rural county leaders oppose removing livestock, viewing it as an existential threat to their way of life and to their communities.

Ethan Lane, a prominent cattle-industry lobbyist, chided what he called an “activist”Congressfor limiting theBLM’s options and insisted lethal measures should be made available.

Some board members warned that rangelands, degraded by wild horses, are approaching a “point of no return” and action can no longer be put off.

But advocates believe horse numbers can be controlled without killing or sterilizing them through the use of “fertility vaccines,” such asPZP, which harnesses mares’ immune system to thwart conception. TheBLM’s use of PZP has dropped off, while it seeks to step up irreversible procedures, such as gelding and ovariectomy.

Board Chairman Fred Woehl, an Arkansas horse trainer, saidPZPis difficult to administer to wild mares and the drug must be re-administered every couple years, arguing spaying is a better option.

Fellow board member Ginger Kathrens insistedBLMmust fully embracefertility controlbefore it ever considers selling horses for slaughter or other lethal measures.

Originally posted by The Salt Lake Tribune