On FILE: Abuse Goes To Court

By Laura Leigh on July 26, 2023

Run in peace beautiful boy. We will fight to protect your herd now.

Today, Wild Horse Education (WHE) has filed a lawsuit against abuses at the Antelope Complex roundup.

Many of you have been watching the ongoing roundup of wild horses through our team reports.

The loss of Sunshine, a wild stallion we knew well, will never be forgotten.

Since July 9, 21 wild horses have died at the Antelope Complex onsite and at least 7 have been orphaned and gone into foster care.

We just wanted to let you know that we are taking abuse back to the courts.

We do not have a lot of time right now to answer email or messages on social media. Please be patient with our small but dedicated team, we are working as fast as we can.

We have filed in court today and have a big fight ahead of us. We are fighting for a ruling that extends far beyond this one roundup. We will update you as soon as we can.

South trap of the Antelope Complex gather concluded today. North trap continues. BLM is trying to represent these as two distinct things, they are not. BLM simply spilt traps into two crews for the first time in history (probably because no other district being placed on the schedule wanted the July slot or for funding convenience or… but not because the Antelope Complex is not considered one place in all underlying planning). Since BLM began this monstrosity of an operation we have feared they will just hit each valley with 2 crews once removal quota is reached in livestock grazing allotments in the south side of Antelope.

In 2017, BLM approved a designated single project area under Environmental Assessment (Gather-EA, DOI-BLM-NV-E030-2017-0010) for the Antelope and Triple B Complexes that spans square acreage larger than the states of Connecticut and Rhode Island combined. BLM has been segmenting roundups by complex due to the sheer size of the area. The gather area for the 2023 Antelope Complex roundup operations span nearly 1.4 million of those acres.

More than 1,400 are still in the target zone.

Since July 9, there have been 21 deaths at the Antelope Complex (north trap and south)

2 mares have suffered broken necks, 1 mare was killed because she was blind in one eye, A stallion suffered a catastrophic compound fracture of his rear leg, 4 foals have died (2 from dehydration, 1 from colic that can be caused by heat and dehydration and one due to lameness), Sorrel foal died : umbilical hernia (an umbilical hernia doesn’t kill you, it can interfere with things like breathing when overly stressed). A stallion broke his neck during loading into a semi-truck to ship to short-term holding. Bay, 15-year old Mare (Female); Death (Chronic-Pre-existing); mare blind in one eye. 20 year old Sorrel mare; Death (Acute/Unexpected); lameness, left rear leg. Sorrel foal (male); Bay, 9-year old Stud (Male); Death (Chronic-Pre-existing); blind in right eye. Death (Chronic/Pre-existing); club footed, both front feet. Bay, 4-year old Stud (Male); Death (Acute/Unexpected); fractured, right rear leg. Bay, foal Colt (Male); Death (Chronic/Pre-existing; fractured, right rear leg (because it happened before capture). Bay, 3-year old Stud (Male); hernia; Sorrel, 1-year old Stud (Male); Death “humpback” (often a sign of extreme pain) 2 on the same day: 20+ year old Bay, blind in one eye.

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It has been a very long road. None of this work could have been possible without your support. Thank you.