The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has released a Decision of NEPA Adequacy (DNA) for the Fifteenmile Herd Management Area (HMA) in northern Wyoming. A DNA is a document that is used when BLM wants to do something and then says they do not have to do any new analysis because they have already completed the required paperwork and “nothing has changed.”

You can find the documents and the green “participate now button” on the BLM website. If you plan to comment, just click the green button and submit your comments by June 13. Or you can mail written comments to: BLM Worland Field Office, Fifteenmile Wild Horse Gather, 101 S. 23rd Street, Worland, WY 82401.

There is a lot of talk about the “zeroing out” of Salt Wells Creek, Great Divide Basin and part of Adobe Town. When you look at the map, the acreage actually managed for wild horses in the entire state, you can see why this is such a big deal.But a small Wyoming HMA needs your attention.

Fifteenmile is a small herd that lives in a really unique area. It is comprised of about 81,000 acres located approximaely 30 miles northwest of Worland, Wyoming, in a very remote part of the Bighorn Basin. Many people do not know that when the Taylor Grazing Act was passed in 1934 (introducing things like grazing permits and fees to stop the absolute destruction of the landscape by domestic livestock following the “dust bowl” years), it also authorized federal removal (assistance) of wild horses. Yes, the federal government and unchecked mustanging are responsible for populations crashing from around 150,000 (1934) to less than 26,000 in 1971 when the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act passed.  The first recorded roundup at Fifteenmile was in 1938.

October, 2019

In August of 2019, BLM finalized what they called a “Herd Management Area Plan Update and Gather Plan.” The only “update” was to change how they phrased AML for the purpose of a specified gather: “Under the Proposed Action the AML will be re-stated as 100 to 230 wild horses, instead of 70 to 160 mature horses, thereby eliminating confusion surrounding total horses versus mature horses. Forage has been allocated for 230 wild horses in the HMA, and when wild horse inventories are conducted, all wild horses are considered adults.” This was due to litigation that challenged removals based on counting foals as breeding adults; essentially they just said on January 1, every foal will be counted as an adult even if it was born in November. BLM finalized a gather plan in 2017 and called it an HMAP (not uncommon and predates our lawsuit in 2024 that established that a gather plan and an HMAP are not the same thing) and then updated it for a specific gather plan in 2019.

In 2019, BLM said there were around 700 wild horses in Fifteenmile. They captured 607, chose to return 95  (after aerial surveys noted they over-estimated the population stating that only about 12 horses in the HMA were not captured). This left what BLM called “approximately 107 wild horses total” in the HMA. Eleven died during capture operations.

In other words… BLM achieved the goal of reaching AML in 2019.

By lumping the HMAP update and gather plan together, BLM likely made a critical error in determining any stretch of actual adequacy of NEPA in the newly released DNA when dealing with a phrase “scope and intensity.” Doing a second gather is outside the “purpose and need” of the “scope and intensity” of the 2019 gather plan.

When crafting sample comments for a DNA, the first thing you look at is “what is BLM proposing.” The second thing you look at is “why do they think nothing has changed and they have the legal authority to do it?”

The WFO is proposing to conduct a gather of excess wild horses in the Fifteenmile HMA and surrounding areas in the fall of 2025. Approximately 310 wild horses would be gathered by helicopter drive trapping in the Fifteenmile HMA. Approximately 210 wild horses would be removed, with approximately 100 wild horses returned to the HMA. Additionally, an estimated 12 wild horses residing outside the HMA, particularly in the area immediately SW of Worland, would be gathered and removed. Action was previously analyzed in the Fifteenmile Herd Management Area Plan.

Plain and simple: They want to do a roundup to “get to AML” and use the 2019 Gather-EA as their authority. But they already achieved the “purpose and need” stated in the 2019 document.

Big things have changed. There were two court wins last year that you can include in your comments.

Sample Comments:

We would like to first thank BLM for doing an infrared survey and including the results in the DNA. Errors with the double count method plaque BLM program wide. The majority of field offices do not include any actual data and we do appreciate the inclusion of the report. 

However, BLM errs that the 2019 Gather-EA is still valid. 

In October of 2019, after finalizing the EA, BLM reached the stated purpose and need of DOI-BLM-WY-R010-2018-0036-EA. As BLM did not create a distinct HMAP update and chose to create a gather plan that only updated the way BLM phrased AML and approved a gather to reach that goal, the goal was reached and the EA is no longer adequate to perform more removals to maintain AML. The court ruled last year that BLM can use long term plans, even with repeated removals, only to reach reach AML (not repeated gathers once AML is reached) and then must complete a new Environmental Assessment, 1:18-cv-2029-RDM. DOI-BLM-WY-R010-2018-0036-EA is not longer valid. 

In 2024, the court also determined that an HMAP (EA or EIS) and a Gather-EA are not the same thing (this case involved an area where the HMAP had been illegally delayed for nearly 40 years and the gather plan failed to analyze impacts on large scale removals of wild horses on fire fuels, a deficit that exists in the 2019 Fifteenmile EA as well) 3:22-cv-00034-MMD-CLB. As the stated goal of DOI-BLM-WY-R010-2018-0036-EA is to reach AML, the BLM must provide a new analysis. 

BLM must rescind the 2025 DNA, DOI-BLM-WY-R010-2025-0017-DNA. where it bases authority in the 2019 EA. (BLM is also overestimating the existing population as it did in 2019 based on the direct count BLM themselves provided. BLM cannot approve a gather in 2025, based on a population range projected out to 2027, presumable in an effort to do repeated gathers and call it a DNA or base any action on a projected, but not yet existing, set of circumstances. 

Thank you. 

You can find the documents and the green “participate now button” on the BLM website. If you plan to comment, just click the green button and submit your comments by June 13. Or you can mail written comments to: BLM Worland Field Office, Fifteenmile Wild Horse Gather, 101 S. 23rd Street, Worland, WY 82401.

Our team is working hard. We have legal briefs due on some of our active litigation and hearings. We are gearing up to bring you the in-depth reporting from roundups you expect from WHE. On top of that, we are engaging with lawmakers to address the necessity of ensuing that the provision to prohibit funding for killing healthy wild horses and burros or selling them without limits (slaughter) is put into the final budget bill after the Presidential Budget request removed that protection.

All of our work is only possible with your support. 

Your support keeps our teams in the field, our investigations running and our litigation alive. Together, we will take a strong stand to defend our precious wild ones.