During the longest night of the year it has become a tradition at WHE to publish a letter from our founder, Laura Leigh.
These letters began in 2010 with a video message. While fighting for access to roundups and holding, she was embroiled in three different court battles. As a journalist she had been offered “red carpet access” to document a roundup in northern Nevada. There was a catch: she had to go alone, leaving representatives from advocacy behind. She chose to fight for all, not for one. She was warned by her attorney not to write about the specifics of the case for several reasons… but she could write about how she felt. Writing from the road, edited on a broken old laptop, she wrote home to her mom and made a video. A personal message for the holiday; a tradition now at WHE.
At nearly 10,000 ft, you can gain perspective if you look.
Dear Mom,
2025 has been a very strange, hard, wonderful, terrible, year.
With the help of so many people, we were able to continue to move lawsuits forward that are building a trail of precedent that are entering the final leg to create real change. Switching the paradigm from “remove” to management planning based on transparent science-backed data has been a dream of justice of mine for a long time. Over the last couple of years we have laid the foundation. This year we set the stage for the final step. I am working really hard to bring these lawsuits to conclusion next year. The lawsuits at Stone Cabin/Saulsbury, Pancake, Carter, etc., could change the framework and bring real the long sought after justice needed to see the true intention of law, to manage wild horses and burros humanely, integral to the land and fairly.
When I think back on the year, of everything I witnessed, this foal is one of the first memories. Looking for his mom after the roundup that day (in holding corrals where there were many serious injuries) I watched as he found her and buried his muzzle in her mane taking in her scent and then buried his head under hers.
I was talking with BLM as my shutter clicked away and I discovered that BLM Wyoming only contracted a vet to put horses down and do necropsies. They also did not include wound treatment or even electrolytes for stressed foals with the roundup contractor. We were able to get them to change gears onsite and include those things in their contracts.
Foals kept dropping off during helicopter drives. This little one followed pronghorn when, after losing sight of it’s family, it saw the antelope. It ran and ran and ran trying to keep up with them down a canyon. I had to really push to get them to look for it. They claimed to have found it in an area where this foal could not have been found (where they had focused the roundup the previous day). I kept saying I hear her… and I was laughed at by both BLM and other observers. Sure enough, over an hour later, she showed herself behind us… as the next drive dropped another foal and this time they listened and went out right away. The drive after that dropped two foals and they listened when I told them where the foals went. It really bothers me that with all the people onsite there are no longer designated spotters looking for lagging foals. We will never know how many get left behind… with a very slim chance of survival on their own.
With all of the work I do every year, the lawsuits, investigations, reports used to try to educate lawmakers, the onsite work is still where my heart is. Being able to use my “experienced eyes” to really look and maybe, just maybe make a difference in the moment… is still both the most heartbreaking and gratifying of all.
Sometimes just being in the right place at the right time can help stop disaster. I had one of our volunteers on a range run last spring and we took a fast look at a cattle guard that needed repair. We were there at the right time to stop a survey helicopter from scaring wild horses onto a highway.
Gaining an enforceable, transparent, adequate, set of real welfare rules is why I stepped foot into advocacy years ago. Mom, I have been doing this for a long time now. In so many instances I have been doing this longer than the BM employees that are trying to rewrite a history they never knew in the first place. Nothing illustrates just how loathe to change BLM is than issues of abuse. Nothing turns my stomach more, is more disrespectful to the horses and burros (and a basic sense of decency) than the unwillingness to formalize welfare rules.
This coming year we may finally be able to turn the welfare policy as well. After years of litigating (and BLM simply lying claiming they reviewed the draft standards we had to litigate to get them to even draft a decade ago) we now how undeniable proof of the failure. Hopefully BLM takes steps to fix it without us needing to bring more litigation. We are sending a letter to the Secretary of the Interior to see if they will do the right thing without the need for Congress or the courts to intervene.
The moments spent with our wild ones continue to fill me with belonging and inspiration. Our wild horses and burros belong on western public lands and live seamlessly in their homes.. if we let them.But cruelty and greed have also been a part of the West since expansion began centuries ago.
As always, too much happens in a year to talk about it in one note.
On these longest nights of the year it is natural for introspection. Our own impact, how we react, is all we can truly control. How we act can have a greater impact like ripples in the sea. I hope we can make some big ripples in the coming year that turn into waves of change…
I think of you always Mom.
You can also take advantage of online shopping and holiday deals at iGive. Thousands of stores will give a percentage of sales to nonprofits, including WHE. If you are shopping online, register and pick your charity of choice as Wild Horse Education and help us while you shop!
Categories: Lead
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