Lawsuit Filed to Uphold Right to Observe Wild Horse Sterilization Experiments

On August 16, 2016, two leading wild horse advocacy organizations filed a lawsuit in the Oregon U.S. District Court. The lawsuit aims to uphold their First Amendment rights to observe controversial sterilization experiments planned by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) on federally-protected wild horses at the Wild Horse Corral Facility in Hines, Oregon.

The Cloud Foundation and American Wild Horse Conservation (formerly American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign), along with veterinarians and a U.S. Congressman, argue that the surgical procedures planned by BLM and Oregon State University (OSU) are invasive, inhumane, outdated, and dangerous. They insist that these procedures should not be conducted behind closed doors.

“The BLM has refused to allow any opportunity for media or the public to observe and record these procedures, despite the fact that such observation would further the BLM’s own stated goal of assessing the ‘social acceptability’ of these procedures,” stated the complaint filed by Nick Lawton of Meyer Glitzenstein & Eubanks LLP, representing the groups. “The BLM’s refusal to allow any access to observe and record these experiments thwarts the important newsgathering objectives that Plaintiffs aim to achieve by observing and documenting the BLM’s treatment of wild horses, and thus violates Plaintiffs’ rights under the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.”

Ginger Kathrens, Executive Director of The Cloud Foundation and the Humane Advocate for the BLM’s National Wild Horse and Burro Advisory Board, stated, “It is abundantly clear that the permanent sterilization of mares is completely unnecessary, horribly cruel, and places wild herds at greater risk of genetic failure. For decades BLM has largely turned its back on humane, reversible infertility vaccines. Now they are opting for invasive procedures, which have no practical application on Western ranges, unless the death of wild mares is an acceptable outcome.”

Suzanne Roy, Executive Director of the American Wild Horse Conservation (formerly American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign), added, “These risky procedures are placing the lives of these innocent and federally-protected wild horses and their unborn foals at grave risk. Spaying will also take the wild out of these wild horses by destroying their natural behaviors – the very thing that distinguishes them from their domestic counterparts. We firmly believe that once American citizens and our elected leaders see what the BLM is doing to our federally-protected wild horses, they simply won’t stand for it.”

The BLM and OSU plan to perform a procedure on wild mares called ovariectomy-by-colpotomy. This involves a veterinarian blindly cutting into a mare’s vaginal wall, placing their hand and arm through the vagina into the abdominal cavity, manually locating the ovaries, and then severing them with a rod-like chain tool called an ecraseur.

The surgery poses risks of death from hemorrhage and infection, as well as evisceration – the protrusion of the bowel through the surgical incision. Additionally, 75 percent of the mares to be experimented on will be pregnant, and the procedure will cause many to abort their unborn foals.

In wild horses, it’s not possible to provide the same post-surgical care available to domestic animals or to forcibly restrain their movement after surgery, resulting in a high risk for infection and pain following the procedure. Removing mares’ ovaries will also cause serious behavioral changes, making this an inappropriate management tool for wild herds.

The groups are seeking an injunction to force BLM to allow them to observe the experiments, which the agency says could begin as early as October.

Originally posted by The Desert Independent.