Pryor Mountain horses

[prizmbluekigers]

Anyone following the story besides me? What a mess. The video of the very young (less than 2 month old) foal who had to run the distance to the pens with his mother and band still has me crying after watching the poor lame foal try to walk 15 feet to its mother in the pens. The public outcry has meant that it is hard to get through to the White House, BLM and Dept of the Interior and folks have been contacting the media and well know animal rights supporters. What if this was our Kigers? BLM should not be the enemy, but they don't help their own image when they pull this kind of stuff. There is an interesting picture of a vet poking at a foal in a chute with a lunge whip and smiling. Whats with that? I am going to try to go to DC for the Sept 28th BLM meeting in Arlington VA. I was saving two weeks vacation to go see my son and family in Germany so I have the time and once upon a time both of my parents and I worked on Capitol Hill so I kind of know how the system works so maybe I can get at least one senator or congressperson to listen. I am but one small voice to lend to the cause but every voice counts. Sorry, to vent, but BLM needs to work toward a better plan to handle the mustangs. Ginger Katherns gets more attention for the Pryors than we probably would due to the Cloud videos she releases, but if you have an opinion then weigh in with the government agencies and be heard please. Hope you don't view this as a rant but consider our roundup is in two years.

[spanishsagegrullas]

I am following it, too, or more to the point I have been sent some information about it plus it is discussed on some non-mustang oriented email lists that I am on.

This is exactly the stuff that people know the BLM is capable of, and in fact is quite common for them, this careless attitude.

I would suggest that not only do you contact your congress man or woman, Ken Salazar, and heck even the white house web site with your thoughts, but also support the ROAM act which is currently in the Senate. One of the many changes it makes is to ban helicopter round ups. It also requires that a more detailed study on the actual carrying capacity of the HMAs be undertaken and more realistic AMLs be created. It also mandates the re-opening of zeroed HMAs (now calleds HAs) for the placement of those "non-adoptables" which presently are doomed to long term holding pens.

Why the herd was soo soo harmful at 190 horses is beyond me.

Diane P.

[desperatehorsewife]

Here's a blog by someone who's there called Pryor Wild:

pryorwild.wordpress.com/

[prizmbluekigers]

I am among the ranks who have been calling, e-mailing and writing letters for weeks. I am beginning to recognize voices in the BLM offices and the offices of several members of Congress. The roundup was halted yesterday and Cloud is already free with some of his band, but now the older horses rounded up are in danger of being sold with title, not adopted which is not what BLM stated they would do originally. Ginger and others are headed up into the mountains to check on the released horses. They said there is another new foal on the mountain so I am glad the babies won't be forced to run a distance. I keep hoping someone will present a workable plan for management and I hope SB1579 ROAM Act (Restore our Americam Mustangs) will pass. The rest of my opinions on the Kigers HMAs are probably best kept to myself. This is not the place to start an argument or decry BLM policies. Meanwhile I am posting a couple of new pictures of the 20-25 member herd we keep seeing under the HMA category. Enjoy

[zingomom]

I've just recently begun educating myself on the policies of the BLM, and I've seen footage of the way their "cowboys" round up these poor traumatized horses using helicopters. I know that placing these horses up for adoption surely beats sending them to the slaughterhouse, but what I want to know is how they came up with the maximum number of horses a piece of land can sustain. In nature, it's always survival of the fittest. Why then do we humans feel so compelled to play God and capture them for their own good. Seems to me mother nature has been working on this problem for years. It's called natural selection.

I'm not opposed to thinning herds in problem areas--a lot of you got your horses that way, but to do that without a workable back-up plan for the "unadoptable" ones is just crazy.

Please let me know what I can do to help get the ROAM act passed. Now that I'm a mustang owner, I have no option but to get involved. Thanks. --Carol

[desperatehorsewife]

Carol, the problem with survival of the fittest with the horses is that they've been turned out by man over the past several centuries and now compete with native wildlife for vegetation. And there simply are not enough natural predators to keep numbers in check; 30,000 horses today will be half a million in 20 years. Human intervention is needed to help with a human caused problem, as far as I can tell.

[DianneC]

The cuts in budget for the BLM have a lot to do with it. The ranches pay per head which means they get a bigger voice than they used to have and the BLM is motivated to put more cows on the land. I remember seeing all the new fences along the road to the Kiger viewing area. We were there several years ago in fall and the ranchers had had a lot of cows out on the Kiger HMA and were rounding up the last to put in fenced areas that had not been grazed. What was left was very sparse feed with no grass to be seen for the Kigers to last them the harsh winter. I called and talked to the new range manager who was concerned that overgrazing by the horses was going to cause the small bunchgrass to be eliminated and ruin the range. She said she was going to open the gates and let the Kigers run the full range, instead of just the fenced area. I think that must have happened since people are seeing them up by the anthill. There was not a hoofprint or a stud pile to be found except really old ones when we were there that fall. So its money, pure and simple.