Anti feral horse organizations

[canyonhunter47]

“Wild” horses have a ton of nonprofits advocating for them and an army of brainwashed worshippers. Is there an equivalent org that focuses on reducing and removing them?

I’m aware of a few conservation organizations and pro-ranching organizations that occasionally speak out on the topic, but they are dismissed as having ulterior motives (“they just want more animals to kill” “they just want to replace the horses with cows”) and it’s not their main focus.

Case in point, the mayor of the City of Scottsdale wants to let the Salt River herd expand into the McDowell mountains preserve, which forms the eastern border of the city and holds a pretty large area habitat for deer, javelina and other native species. She’s getting some pushback from citizens, but not the concerted effort to make any proposal DOA.

 

[Chris in TN]

I love this idea. Horses are beautiful but they are invasive. If we're gonna get rid of smallmouth bass in western rivers, we should get rid of horses and burros for the same reason.

<----really regrets not fishing the Yampa for smallies before CO declared war on them.

 

[jolemons]

Feral horses are one of the few topics on which I send letters to politicians. Not surprisingly, their canned responses to my letters are always pro feral horse. It's obvious the aids see a letter on horses and assume it's pro feral horse and then send me the appropriate canned response. This tells me that they aren't getting much engagement from those opposing the matter.

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[Pony Soldier]

Animal managment is necessary with all of them. You have to match the numbers to available feed and the competition with other species. My horses will eat me out of house and home without control. Unless it gets popular to eat them the next choice is to shoot them. In a society of $40,000 atvs the demand for redistribution is very limited. Sterilization is expensive.

Control is critical for the shared habitat but emotion in society makes that difficult to impossible. Rotting horse carcases near town can be breath taking.

Solutions to this problem are limited.

 

[canyonhunter47]

Animal managment is necessary with all of them. You have to match the numbers to available feed and the competition with other species. My horses will eat me out of house and home without control. .

That is 100% the case with the salt River herd. There’s something like 10 times the number of horses that a grazing allotment for cattle would be. The horse organizations have been feeding them for years and it was a huge battle just to get birth control shots

 

[IAm_Not_Lost]

Well, much of this is regulated by the Wild and Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971 and Public Rangelands Improvement Act (PRIA).

It pretty clearly spells out what can and can’t be done.

BLM’s primary tactic is fertility control and rounding them up for private adoption. But tons and tons of horses still wind up just being cared for in off-site holding pens basically.

 

[wyosam]

Well, much of this is regulated by the Wild and Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971 and Public Rangelands Improvement Act (PRIA).

It pretty clearly spells out what can and can’t be done.

BLM’s primary tactic is fertility control and rounding them up for private adoption. But tons and tons of horses still wind up just being cared for in off-site holding pens basically.

I don’t think there’s ever a reality where repealing that law and aerial gunning them out of existence is anything but political suicide. So we’ll keep on spending a ludicrous amount of money badly managing them.


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[Blake C]

Chemical castration. Let them live there life but not able to reproduce.

 

[IAm_Not_Lost]

I don’t think there’s ever a reality where repealing that law and aerial gunning them out of existence is anything but political suicide. So we’ll keep on spending a ludicrous amount of money badly managing them.


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Definitely not one easy answer. They spend about 150 million on care annually, which is a lot, but also not a lot in the big scheme of things.

Chemical castration. Let them live there life but not able to reproduce.

That is what they do already. There isn’t just a pill you can give a horse once to prevent them from ever producing a child. They have vaccines though that are fairly effective and usually only need a booster.

 

[CorbLand]

If someone did start one, it has to be a 501c4 so they can lobby. Thats the only way anything could change but anything actually ever happening large scale has a near zero chance.

 

[canyonhunter47]

They have vaccines though that are fairly effective and usually only need a booster.

Birth control along with attrition and adoption is basically the only way to address the problem without piles of carcasses and the resulting outcry. It’ll just take 10-20 years to work.

In the mean time, the horse organizations will be complaining about genetic diversity and “genocide” without much pushback except from scattered and competing views like hunters, ranchers, and certain environmentalist groups

 

[jolemons]

GonaCon is the only GnRH product on the market. It is expensive, requires an annual booster and not efficacious to deliver broadly. There are a few private firms developing technology for administering. There isn't any money to be made, so they have struggled with funding, except a few angel investors.

A long release GnRH that can be effectively administered would certainly help.

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[LostArra]

I deer hunt south of this ranch. He has some sweetheart deal with BLM to "adopt" wild horses (feed and vet bills are paid by tax payers). He then charges foreign "eco tourists" to ride around in a sxs to take pics. The good part for my hunting is the deer avoid most of his property.

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