Sue Wallis's "Organizations of the Horse" Cornering Market on Wild Horsemeat Cloning

http://ppjg.wordpress.com/2010/04/02/slaughterhouse-sue-wallace-conrad-burnsviagen-and-the-blm-the-people-behind-the-slaughter-of-nevadas-mustangs/

Nevadas Newly Formed "Feral Horse Commission" Seeks to Take Wild Horse & Burros Water Rights Away

http://www.examiner.com/equine-policy-in-los-angeles/wild-horse-water-wars-on-the-horizon

However,.....

By its own laws, BLM has a DUTY to SUE for Water Rights on Public Lands / Excerpt from Jubic v. BLM,..2008. Dismissed for lack of standing. Merit of issues not addressed;

BLMs Claim of Insufficient Water

61. Water sources in arid regions are always “limited.” However, the Ely / Lincoln County Districts of Nevada have the largest water supply in the whole of the state with numerous streams, wells, rivers and creeks. Furthermore, there are plans for a great expansion for increased water sources for the entire state of Nevada as is part of the development plans for this area . (See "Ely District Development Plans, ROD Ex.C). See also Notice of Availability of the Final Environmental Impact Statement for the Lincoln County Land Act Groundwater Development and Utility Right-of-Way Project, Nevada

62. Also as a result of the development plans, wildlife areas are being expanded with plans to put water "guzzers" in place so that the wild deer and elk will have water. Plaintiff submits that the defendants have a duty to provide for or allow access to same for our Nation’s wild horse herds. Plaintiff argues that the problem is not a lack of water sources but a lack of water rights. Nevada is a state that claims rights to all the waters and water sources within the state and, in fact, has been involved with much litigation with the BLM on this matter. A great part of the water problems on federal lands is owing to the fact that more grazing permits than ever are being retired. When that happens, the ranchers, who claim the water rights based upon state law “custom and usage,” shut off their "guzzlers" and other water supplies to the lands as they are no longer needed for their cows. As a consequence, the wild horses are forced to travel further in search of water, sometimes crossing invisible jurisdictional lines and getting themselves into trouble and danger of being shot by the ranchers as “strays.”.

63. There is no doubt that acquiring access to Nevadas waters is a legal, not a geographic problem or based on insufficiencies. Plaintiff submits that despite the difficulties and legalities involved in achieving water rights in Nevada, the BLM nevertheless has a duty to see to it that adequate water is available for the wild horses that roam within their various HMAs. Plaintiff further submits that the defendants have failed in that duty;

"It is BLM policy to conform with applicable state laws and administrative claims procedures for water rights when managing and administering all BLM programs and projects, except as otherwise specifically mandated by Congress. The State Engineer Office in the Division of Water Resources of the Nevada Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, administers water rights programs in Nevada based on beneficial use and the Doctrine of Prior Appropriation. The State of Nevada regulates its water rights programs using guidance in chapters 533 and 534 of the Nevada Revised Statutes. The BLM will acquire and perfect water rights necessary for public land management purposes according to these state laws and procedures. (Emphasis added.) The BLM also will protect existing water rights of the U.S. by protesting or providing comment during the state permitting process on applications for new water rights or for changes to existing water rights that may interfere with BLM’s ability to utilize such water for public land management purposes."

http://www.blm.gov/pgdata/etc/medialib/blm/nv/field_offices/ely_field_office/ely_resource_management/rmppdftext.Par.1543.File.dat/04%20-%20ELY%20PRMP%202007%20Chapter%202.pdf

BLM needs to sue Nevada for water-rights on our public lands. If they do not, they are leaving themsleves open to a lawsuit from one of us for dereliction of their duty to so provide.

A New Act to Protect Public Lands & Wildlife, but Will it Help Our Nations Wild Equines? Not at all.

Click on title above to go to article and read more;

http://publiclandwars.wordpress.com/2009/10/25/a-new-act-to-protect-public-lands-wildlife-but-will-it-help-wild-horses-and-burros/

Plan for million-acre horse sanctuary hits hurdle as "Friends of Harry Reid" Object

Here the Elko Co Board of Commissioners (Friends of Reid) object to this plan claiming that the 9,000 cattle running there are "currently generating revenue which contributes to the county's economy," but what they "forget" to tell us is that the cost of administration of the Grazing Permit Program to taxpayers is approximately 500 mil per year, all tolled. Truth is, those 9,000 cows now grazing on that ranch are costing U.S. money to keep them there.....so how can they say the cows are contributing to the economy? This is what I mean when I say dont believe the hype that cows on welfare are good for the economy,...and since when does a County Bd. of Commissioners have a say to what use the ranch is put? Is it not a privately owned ranch of which only the owner would have a say? Afterall, we are not talking about a re-zoning or any other "change of use" plan here. The place would still be a ranch used primarily for grazing.


October 14, 2009

The Winecup-Gamble Ranch is about a million acres in size.

Plans to use a million-acre ranch in northeastern Nevada once owned by the actor Jimmy Stewart as a wild horse sanctuary have been rejected by officials.
A proposal by Winecup-Gamble Ranch to change from cattle to horse grazing has been rejected by the Elko County Board of Commissioners.

The ranch, about 110km northeast of the city of Elko, comprises about 250,000 acres of deeded land and 750,000 acres owned mostly by the Bureau of Land Management, as well as some private land. The ranch has full access and a grazing permit over the bureau lands.

The property, which was also once owned by Bing Crosby, has operated as a cattle and sheep property since the late 1800s and runs about 9000 cattle, with the ability to support up to 12,500.

The Elko County Board of Commissioners heard an application to move the ranch from cattle to horses, the intention being to take up to 10,000 of the wild horses currently held in captivity by the bureau.

The plan for the property includes a lodge, visitor centre and museum detailing the history of wild horses.

However, the county commissioners ruled against the proposal.

In its written decision, it said the ranch currently generated revenue which contributed to the county's economy. (BS)

"If the ranch becomes a holding facility for wild horses, it will become an enterprise supported by the American taxpayers and will cost millions of dollars," they said. (BS)

"There are many wild horses in the state of Nevada," (BS) they continued. "If that were not the case, there may be some justification for having wild horses on a controlled area such as the Winecup-Gamble Ranch to provide a place for the public to view wild horses.

"However, because of the large number of horses in the state, they are visible from nearly every highway in the state." (BS)


The commissioners pointed out that before horses could be placed on the ranch, the 1971 legislation that provided protection to mustangs would have to be changed as horses did not exist in the area before that date. (BS)

"To open the 1971 Wild Horse Act for this reason would set a bad precedence that may result in the wild horse ranges expanding throughout the state." (BS)

Containment of wild horses within the ranch boundaries would be difficult, the commissioners believed. (BS)

"Most importantly, this is only a temporary solution to the overpopulation problem of wild horses within the state of Nevada. This only diverts attention from the serious problem that needs to be dealt with - that of controlling the wild horse population in order to protect the ranges upon which they live."

The commissioners' ruling came just days before a proposal by the US Interior Secretary Ken Salazar to establishment up to seven new preservation areas further east of the western rangelands to accommodate wild horses in non-reproducing herds.

The commissioners also decided to write to local senators and the Interior Department opposing the ranch's proposal.

Elko County is the fourth-largest county in the United States by land area.

Update: Wild Horse & Burro Protection Campaigns

Click on title above to see our latest "Rally Congress" petitions. If you believe in our cause(s) as outlined in them,...please sign and pass them around. Once signed, a copy will be automatically sent in your name to your own state legislatiors.

I-Team Special: The Stampede to Oblivion

Sunday, October 11, 2009 11:52 PM EST
LasVegasNow.com

On Saturday the I-Team aired a primetime special detailing the long history of alleged mismanagement in the BLM's wild horse and burro program.

Half of the country's wild horses are in Nevada and the BLM is gathering them off of public land in record numbers with increasingly thin justifications behind the roundups.

Critics allege the BLM has repeatedly engineered or otherwise contributed to the conditions on public ranges, which are later used to justify the removal of horses. Fences have cut the horses off from water and forage all over the west, which BLM then uses as a reason to round them up.

Overall, BLM has gathered a quarter of a million horses off the public range, but what's happening now is different from previous years, both in scale and long-term intent, and it is happening with virtually no oversight.

"They are saying, ‘Okay, we will do what we want.' They just totally caved in. What the public doesn't already realize is that these greatly reduced herd management areas are already a very serious reduction. But now they're just going for broke. They are saying, ‘Hell, get rid of them,'" said Craig Downer.

"We have taken the number of horses off the range by over 50-percent in 20 years. For these people to say the horses are out of control, the numbers are out of control, there isn't anything out there that's realized a 50-percent decrease in the last two decades. Certainly not the number of cattle out there," said Jerry Reynoldson.

By almost any measure, there has been a dramatic shift. The pace of the government roundups has jumped over the last several years, averaging more than 9,000 head per year. As of early 2009, there are more than 33,000 horses in places like Ridgecrest, California or Fallon, Nevada -- more horses than exist on the open range.

Once they get to government corrals, they're no longer wild horses. Essentially they become wards of the state -- welfare horses living off the public dole and for the rest of their lives, they will be warehoused at either government pens or private ranches.

Chief Investigative Reporter George Knapp will explore how the wild horse program got in such bad shape and what can be done to turn it around, including a plan by billionaire philanthropist Madeleine Pickens that would create an eco-tourism destination featuring the horses.

Click on title above to go to the orignal publication to see a five (5) part hour long video of the Investigation, and a place to leave comments...

http://www.lasvegasnow.com/Global/story.asp?S=11285225

Grijalva lauds Obama plan on preserves for wild horses

Conservationist, however, calls it 'the easy way out'
By Tony Davis
Arizona Daily Star
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 10.09.2009

A Tucson Democratic congressman who has led the fight to save wild horses had high praise this week for a new Obama administration plan to move thousands of the horses and burros to new preserves in the Midwest and East.

An official with the Arizona branch of a national conservation group, however, denounced the new program as unrealistic and "the easy way out."

On Wednesday, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced a plan to create seven new preserves — two federally owned and five privately owned — each to take about 3,600 horses and burros. It is a dramatic change from earlier Interior Department warnings that slaughtering some of the 69,000 wild horses and burros now under federal control might be necessary to combat rising costs of maintaining them.

Nearly 37,000 wild horses and burros roam in Nevada, California, Wyoming and other Western states. Arizona has only about 400 wild horses and 1,800 wild burros on Bureau of Land Management Land and another 200 to 400 on Forest Service land. Another 32,000 horses and burros are cared for in corrals and pastures in Kansas, Oklahoma and South Dakota.

U.S. Rep. Raúl Grijalva of Tucson praised the proposal, although it didn't go as far as the bill he has proposed that would free up 19 million acres across the West for horses to roam. That bill has passed the House and is pending in the Senate.
"It's a step forward in the right direction, even though it's not everything we want," said Natalia Luna Rose, Grijalva's press secretary. "The administration is listening. The congressman is happy to see this in motion."

But there's no way the feds can avoid having horses killed unless horse adoption rates increase tenfold, Larry Audsley countered, and they've been declining in recent years for what federal officials say are reasons linked to the bad economy.
"The plan they are coming up with is not sustainable," said Audsley, speaking for the Arizona Wildlife Federation. "They are taking the easy way out. They are seeking a political solution, not an environmentally sustainable solution."
But the current program is not sustainable for the animals, the environment or taxpayers, Salazar said.

The Bureau of Land Management's wild horse program cost about $50 million this year, and the cost is expected to grow to at least $85 million by 2012, officials said. The cost of buying land for the proposed preserves — at locations that have yet to be disclosed — is estimated at about $96 million

Salazar and the BLM have to do something, since a Senate committee was preparing to vote on Grijalva's bill, commonly known as the ROAM act, said Julianne French, a wild-horse advocate in Tucson. It's already passed the House.
"But I don't think the horses belong in sanctuaries," said French, a board member of the Cloud Foundation, a Colorado Springs organization dedicated to preserving wild horses and burros on public lands.

Ginger Kathrens of Colorado Springs, filmmaker and wild- horse advocate who has chronicled the lives of a wild-horse herd in Montana, said that blocking reproduction could alter the animals' behavior. "It takes the wild out of wild-horse herds," she said. "They're families in sophisticated societies. Creating gelding herds and preventing them from reproducing is managing them toward extinction."

But ranchers, who see wild horses as competing with cattle for grasses and water, welcomed the proposal. Jeff Eisenberg, executive director for the Public Lands Council, a group that works on public-lands issues for ranchers, said Salazar's proposal was a big step toward a solution. "Horses are important, but people and their livelihood and food production are important, too," Eisenberg said. "We're for balance."

Grijalva called Salazar's plan a significant improvement from those of previous Republican administrations, and said he looks forward to continuing to forge common ground among various advocates.

A Tucson environmentalist who comes down in the middle on this question is state Rep. Daniel Patterson, a Democrat who is also Southwest director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility. "There are big problems that wild horses and burros can do to native wildlife, but the big question is how do you deal with them? On one side some people say gun them down, others say do nothing. I believe they should be humanely managed."

The New York Times and the Associated Press contributed to this story. Contact reporter Tony Davis at 806-7746 or tdavis@azstarnet.com. Follow Tony Davis on Twitter at twitter.com/tonydavis987


Click on title above to go to original article and to comment;
http://www.azstarnet.com/metro/312481

Bureau of Reclamation Responsible for Disappearing Wild Horses?

Section 2. Authority to Enter into an Agreement: Through delegation of authority from the Secretary of the Interior to the Director of BLM and to the Commissioner of Reclamation, agreements may be executed between Reclamation and BLM to provide for mutually beneficial land and water use planning and management activities. Statutory authority for such agreements includes: section 307, Federal Land Policy and Management Act (FLPMA), 43 U.S.C. 1737; Economy Act, 31 U.S.C. 686; and the
Reclamation Act of 1902, 43 U.S.C; Chapter 12, as amended and supplemented.

Excerpt of Agreement “Law” Between Bureau of Reclamation and the BLM

Sec. “S” – “ Wild and Free-Roaming Horses and Burros. When wild and free-roaming horses or burros inhabit areas crossing aministrative boundaries between BLM and Reclamation, their management and protection will be the responsibility of BLM, under its regulations. Upon request from Reclamation, BLM will cooperate in the removal, and relocation or disposal, of such animals from Reclamation lands (see section S.A.)”

Bureau of Reclamation Website;http://www.usbr.gov/

The Law: Click on title above to read; http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/realestate/fltmanual/fltappend12.pdf

Wyoming "selling" Wild Horses Cheap: Creating a "Kill-buyers Ball"

Wild horses roam the Red Desert in this 2006 file photo. (Ken Driese/Star-Tribune correspondent)

Oh yes, they call it "adoption," but we know what happens to the "adopted" ones after only one year.....

By JEFF GEARINO
Southwest Wyoming bureau
Friday, March 6, 2009 11:01 PM MST


ROCK SPRINGS -- It's a sure sign that things really are tough all over: rock-bottom prices for horses.

Bureau of Land Management officials announced the agency will offer 30 mares for adoption at its Rock Springs holding facility next week for a "special incentive fee" of $25 per animal, or $100 off the regular fee.

Three other horses will be available for adoption at the regular fee of $125, said BLM spokeswoman Lorraine Keith.

The offer is a spin on a past BLM price offer -- $125 per horse and $25 more for a "buddy" -- and is indicative of the agency's struggle to find buyers for wild horses.

The 30 mares, two halter-trained two-year-old geldings and one halter-trained five-year-old mare to be offered in the Rock Springs sale were captured last year during BLM wild horse roundups.

The roundups depleted herds in the Salt Wells, White Mountain, Little Colorado, Great Divide Basin and Adobe Town herd management areas in southwest Wyoming.


The reduced fee is one of the agency's latest efforts to boost sagging wild horse adoptions, which have declined sharply in the past year because of the economic downturn.

The BLM rounds up wild horses from herds in Wyoming that have grown too large to be sustained by the available forage, and makes them available for adoption by the public.

Without any predators, wild horse populations can grow quickly and put strains on available federal habitat.

There are about 33,000 wild horses on public rangelands across the West and some 4,500 wild horses in Wyoming, most of which are located in Sweetwater County.

There are also about 33,000 horses and burros currently in BLM holding pens across the country at a cost of about $28 million per year.

In 2002, more than 7,700 horses were adopted nationwide, according to BLM figures. But last year, as part of a steady decline, the number of adopted horses dropped to 3,700.

For the past several years, BLM biologists have been ramping up contraceptive programs in an effort to reduce fertility in wild herds. The Government Accountability Office has suggested the BLM consider euthanizing wild horses to cut costs.

And last year, Madeleine Pickens, the wife of Texas oil tycoon T. Boone Pickens, proposed establishing a privately financed wild horse sanctuary that could be home to the excess animals gathered from Western ranges.

Contact southwest Wyoming bureau reporter Jeff Gearino at 307-875-5359 or gearino@tribcsp.com




http://www.casperstartribune.net/articles/2009/03/07/news/wyoming/3227093a9b0c8f138725757200057060.txt

Madeleine Pickens ABC's "Person of the Week" for Wild Horse Save

Above all, Madeleine Pickens, wife of oil billionaire T. Boone Pickens, is an animal lover. As a horse breeder and a philanthropist, she has always considered that people must be responsible for the care of animals.


Animal lover and philanthropist rescues thousands of wild horses.
"Animals don't have a voice, and as long as man is their protectorate, we have a responsibility to take care of them," she said. "We cannot abandon them."

After her husband gave $7 million to the Red cross to help Hurricane Katrina victims, she wanted to help the animal victims, too.

"I managed to hire an airliner, a cargo airliner and I went on my first trip down to Baton Rouge and we picked up 200 dogs," she said. "I think we got about 800 dogs and cats out to California and Colorado and got them adopted out."

So when Pickens heard that thousands of wild mustangs might be euthanized, she wouldn't sit still for it.

Click on title above for story and vid;
http://abcnews.go.com/WN/story?id=6307278&page=1

Wild Horse Special on ABC News

Click on title above for newstory and video
http://abcnews.go.com/WN/story?id=6307278&page=1

BLM: All About "Resource Development"

Well we all know its not about cows anymore,....but here it is straight "from the horses mouth," so to speak,..no pun intended;

“Whether or not cattle are there, those horses are causing damage to our wetlands, impacting our native species and wildlife,” Steblein said,project manager at the Sheldon-Hart Mountain National Wildlife Refuge

However, despite Mr. Stebleins' apparent concern over the "flaura & fauna" of Nevadas Rangelands and its wildlife,.. after viewing yesterdays WH&B Advisory Committee Meeting, it is apparent that its not REALLY about "protecting the land" anymore either, but about "resource development." The BLM does NOT consider our wild horses as resources. Therein lies the problem. The BLM is ALL ABOUT LAND and "resource development," and what is land these days but a "rescource" and a very valuable one at that. The wild horses are a liability to the BLM and its plan for "resource development." Not only are the horses in the way of the six-million cows that are grazing on their lands (for a measley $18. per year!) but they are also in the way of mining permits and operations, BIG Game Hunting and permits, but now they are in the way of "resource developmemt." And just what is "resource development," you may ask?
One of the speakers at yesterdays meetings admitted that "its all about" resource development. She said that some of the ranchers are giving up trying to eek out a living ranching and are selling off their privately owned lands to developers. The speaker boldly stated that the surrounding lands nearby these new development areas are worth "far more" for development than could ever be worth for ranching! So the BLM is into "building communities" now, or would like to be? How nice for the Powers-That-Be, (PTB) but not so nice for the American public or the horses.

November 18, 2008 9:31 AM