The agency plans to remove 750 with this roundup, then further decrease the remaining herd in the coming months and years through bait-and-trap operations and fertility control.
A wild horse group is running television ads opposing the roundup and U.S. Rep. Joe Neguse wants to block funding for future helicopter operations.
It took federal land managers about a month to capture 18 wild horses by hiding in the sagebrush not far from a corral baited with food and fresh water. In a week, a helicopter buzzing across the rugged prairie of western Colorado has captured more than 400.
The efficiency of a helicopter roundup is the reason the U.S. Bureau of Land Management has hired cowboys and pilots to round up thousands of horses across the West in the past few years, a massive effort to thin a mustang population that federal officials say is degrading public lands and wildlife habitat.
Since the helicopter took flight last Friday, searching for bands of horses on the Piceance-East Douglas rangeland near the Utah border, wranglers have corralled 412 horses, for a June-July total of 195 mares, 158 stallions and 82 foals. They euthanized two horses — a 2-month-old foal with a chronic leg issue called dropped pasterns, and a 16-year-old mustang with severe arthritis in his front legs.
The agency plans to remove 750 with this roundup, then further decrease the remaining herd in the coming months and years through bait-and-trap operations and fertility control.
National Debate
The roundup is elevating the national debate about how to deal with the mustang population in the West, which is estimated at about 82,000. Wild horse groups, along with Gov. Jared Polis and U.S. Rep. Joe Neguse, of Lafayette, have called for an end to helicopter roundups and asked instead for more bait-and-trap gathers and investment in a fertility vaccine that’s shot through a dart.
Neguse introduced an amendment to an appropriations bill this week that would eliminate funding for mustang roundups that use helicopters or planes. The congressman, along with the governor, objected to the roundup of the Piceance-East Douglas herd, but his request to the BLM for a delay was ignored.
“I am deeply concerned about BLM moving forward with these roundups,” Neguse said in a news release.
We Say: How many Presidents and Congressional sessions have we sat through witnessing the ongoing destruction of our wild horses and burros while they do nothing? It is a stain on the soul of America that it continues — especially while the great numbers of American people, demanding that the US government stop the destruction of our federally protected Mustangs, is completely ignored. This is not democracy. It is tyranny. — Tuesday’s Horse Staff.
Featured Image: A mustang tries to escape a corral after being captured in the Piceance-East Douglas range this week. Provided by WilsonAxpe Photography/American Wild Horse Campaign.
Tuesday’s Horse
Official Blog of The Fund for Horses
Tuesday's Horse 
One more thing. I would guess that most of these horses will end up at the meat auction where they are purchased to be shipped to Mexico, Canada and Europe to be slaughtered for horse meat. China consumes about 300,000 horses a year and its certainly not done humanely. Plus these people are breaking the law. Mustangs are federally protected. Can you tell? Lawbreakers. All of them. They should absolutely be prosecuted. Will they???????????
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You are so right. Sorry to repeat ourselves. These are federally PROTECTED horses. They are federally protected for a reason. Yet this is all happening and has been for decades. We are surprised there are as many left in the wild as they say.
It is our guess that no one in the federal government has any idea how many wild horses and burros there are, have been rounded up and killed or slaughtered. They trap and gather and round them up and kill them. It is disgusting.
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WE can complain all we want but nothing is going to change. HELLLOOOO PEOPLE! It’s gonna take a whole lot more than just ‘comments’ on here about how stupid this is and dangerous to the horses and how much we hate it but it still won’t change. Time to get A N G R Y! and let them know it!
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Whose hare brained idea was this? Helicopters. REALLY. What else did you expect. This is unsafe, unsound and a really stupid thing to do. Lets just stress them out, and run them ragged. there is no place TO run. The foals cannot keep up with their Mothers. They’ll have broken legs and all kinds of things go wrong. This is the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen. EVER. Someone should be fired for this!!!!!! Fire them
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This angers and saddens me so. I spent 15 years working on nearby West Douglas to which there is cross over with PED.
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