Cell phone photo, Broken Arrow (aka Indian Lakes) right after the facility opened for intake of Calico wild horses in 2009. Foal died of hoof slough (feet began to fall off)
Welfare issues in BLM holding facilities have existed for a long time.
This problem has been compounded through the approval of new privately owned facilities where the public has no access to document and address welfare issues and spur adoption efforts (in part) to help gain both good homes for healthy horses and burros and homes that can provide care BLM cannot when it could make the difference between life and death.
Background
The foal in the photo above, that we named “Hope Springs Eternal,” was key to the founding of Wild Horse Education. Pushed relentlessly for miles and miles over volcanic rock with a helicopter coming within 5 feet of the foal into the trap, he was then sent into a newly constructed facility that did not even have a chute system installed yet to provide a location for proper medical care.
Our founder was allowed into the sick pens if she left her camera in her vehicle as part of a private tour she was given as a member of the media (she was writing for a small horse magazine at the time). The facility was not open to the public and weekly tours were by appointment only (at that time). Multiple sick pens were filled with little ones that were injured. Some had bandaged wounds, some had open wounds and the vast majority were limping. This foal would not even raise his head when she vocalized and his eyes were glassy. There was not even a wind break installed as this foal lay dying on the frozen ground. BLM simply commented “he has ouchie feet.” Our founder had the presence of mind to turn on her cell phone camera and palm the device.
She made an offer to adopt the colt. BLM was giving other foals to rescues where they have personal
relationships, but BLM refused. Instead, a bizarre series of follow-up calls took place where BLM
kept telling her the colt was fine and she prepared to take the foal once branded. The last phone call
told her the foal had died and that vet reports were online. The report was not online. And when
BLM finally loaded the report it could be seen that the colt had died while BLM was telling her it was
fine. The report had no basic information, no identification (like an exact intake date, pen number or
markings) and not even treatment dates for the Bute (essentially horsey ibuprofen) the colt had been
given three times in ten days as it died from hoof slough.
The events surrounding this colt led to the founding of WHE and our battle to gain an enforceable welfare policy.
Same pen in 2016 completed with wind breaks and electrical outlets. This is the location where we first met “Hope”
The fight against abuse has been a long one. You can learn more HERE.
Every step forward is met with a massive pushback from BLM. It really seems absurd. The single most controversial piece of the BLM is when preventable injury and death makes the news. You would think BLM would make cleaning up these instances a priority.
Instead, the agency that is tasked by Congress for over 50 years to provide humane care for our wild horses and burros vehemently resists truly reforming. What should be the easiest area of the program for reform, welfare, has turned into a word game and one of hide and seek.
Glimpse down an alley at Blue Wing burros eating under what looks like a section of highway guardrail. We were not allowed down the alley to view burros. If it were not for the very long lens, we would not even see this hodgepodge fencing in a facility with a multimillion dollar government contract and extremely green feed containing alfalfa (not a good burro diet) . Axtel, 2024.
With holding facilities, BLM now hides daily care and handling behind the words “the contract.”
In the last 15 years, the only facilities BLM has created are “privately owned.” The system of processing and holding wild horses and burros has been in the process of privatizing. Taxpayer money spent to house a public resource (wild horses and burros) and you are not allowed to see how that money is spent and how your wild ones are being cared for!
Instead of creating contracts that provide for monthly viewing, the contracts usually include vague language about an annual or biannual limited tour that limits any ability to assess conditions to months after capture and after everything has been cleaned up. Normal daily activities are not witnessed at all at new facilities.
The only time you can get in at all is if they decide to do a (sanitized) tour. These tours apparently take weeks of preparation, cleaning, moving injured or sick horses and burros into pens you cannot see or off-site. BLM says the preparation for these tours costs lots of money. If the facilities are providing appropriate care and cleaning regularly, why would it cost a lot of money to clean it before the public gets there?
Above: Foals born in privately owned facilities in 2010 and 2024. Both slowly starving to death. The abysmal oversight of facilities leads to slow and painful deaths.
The two foals above that show the neglect in these facilities are far from the only examples. During tours of these privately contracted facilities over the last 15 years, there have been numerous occasions where an injury or illness was pointed out to BLM staff even after the facility “cleaned up.”
“Welfare” In the Contract
BLM insists that the legal requirements for humane handling are met citing the Comprehensive Animal Welfare Program (CAWP) in contracts.
CAWP is a series of (unenforceable) guidelines. BLM has a selected group of employees that serve on the CAWP team from the program (peer reviewing peer).
The BLM team will go to a few facilities each year. Most facilities have only had one visit from the CAWP team since reviews began in 2022. In 2024, the only short-term (processing facility) BLM published a review for was in Wheatland (WY).
The BLM CAWP team has not visited the off-limits to the public facility in Winnemucca (NV) since it began taking in wild horses and burros in 2022, not even once. The public has only had one opportunity to visit where no adoptions would be facilitated.
Horses needing a trim at Broken Arrow (aka Indian Lakes) privately owned facility “annual tour.” Hoof care is not like a manicure. Lifelong issues can arise in feet and legs from neglect.
When BLM chooses a facility to send newly captured wild horses or burros to (the most fragile post-capture timeframe) they do not even take their CAWP team reviews into account.
Did you know the only determining factors are distance to capture location and the lowest bid?
Essentially BLM is leaving compliance with (substandard) standards in the hands of those rewarded for cutting corners on hay, hoof care, veterinary care, basic staff for record keeping, etc.
BLM has no system that encourages and rewards those that provide better care. A facility can have violations on the most basic issues like record keeping and vaccinations and still make the top of the receive list if they have the lowest bid. A facility can have a death rate higher than the average and it is not taken into account when they chose where to send animals or expanding the facility. Indian Lakes in Fallon (NV) was given approval to more than double capacity regardless of the BLM CAWP team abysmal review.
BLM also refuses to include monthly visitation in the contract so the public can, once again, pick up the slack for the lack of oversight by BLM in the program.
Over the next few days we will continue to address issues in holding facilities with specific examples from our team on the substandard care afforded to our wild ones at your expense.
The budget bills are being pushed rapidly through Congress now. Simple funding for completion of formalization of actual concise welfare standards that have enforceability is not included in the bill. Funding for the Wild Horse and Burro program continues the status quo with more funding for population control (removals, fertility control) to keep pushing populations down to the non-science based allowable numbers and keeping population numbers dangerously low as private profit-driven interests take more and more of the public lands necessary for herd survival.
Our wild ones desperately need an enforceable welfare policy that is crafted with transparency, public participation and complies with current welfare standards for equines.
Please Call Congress (202) 224-3121. Tell the operator who your representative is (or where you live if you do not know) and you will be connected to an aide in the office.
Request an amendment to the funding bill for the Department of Interior to create a line item for funding for Rulemaking to formalize an enforceable welfare policy for the BLM Wild Horse and Burro Program.
Our team is working hard in the field and in the courts. Without your support, none of our work is possible. Thank you for keeping WHE running for our wild ones!
Spotlight, Facilities:
Last week Wild Horse Education and Rewilding America Now filed a brief with the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals to shed light on neglect and abuse in the current BLM system of holding focusing on the privately owned facility in Winnemucca, NV.
One short life. How the system failed a baby burro.
Next in the series coming soon: Facilities and the CAWP
Categories: Wild Horse Education
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