To: Edwin Roberson, Assistant Director, Renewable Resources and Planning BLM, Dean Bolstad, Senior Advisor BLM, and Joan Guilfoyle, Division Chief BLM
BLM: Take Better Care of Captive Wild Herds – Stop Warehousing Them
The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) should immediately implement a quarantine at the Palomino Valley Complex (PVC) and any other similarly infected wild horse holding facilities until all signs of infections in the current captive wild horse populations disappear. BLM should immediately provide appropriate treatment of diseases present in the wild horses, and follow standard protocol to minimize the spread of these diseases. BLM should stop full-scale roundups and halt all warehousing of wild herds. If BLM cannot hire adequate personnel to care for animals in holding, they must accept help from animal welfare organizations to assist in the care of the wild horses and burros.
Why is this important?
Several diseases are now rampant in Bureau of Land Management (BLM) wild horse holding facilities due to poor husbandry and overcrowding. Currently, none of the diseases is life threatening, but all of the diseases make the horses uncomfortable and can permanently disfigure the horses (papilloma virus creates bloody warts all over their faces), making their chances for adoption nil, and making them vulnerable to being sent to slaughter. In addition, the horses' hooves are not being trimmed. Some are in danger of being permanently lame from lack of trimming for over one year. Clearly space is currently limited, and conditions are untenable for removing any more animals from the range and placing them in the BLM wild horse warehouse system. For more information on the plight of our wild horses and burros and to support efforts to save them, go to http://wildhorseeducation.org