Myths About Mustangs

Myths About Mustangs

Although there are many controversial topics concerning wild Mustangs, a few of the major misconceptions are explained here. As you will see, there is sometimes a grain of truth to the myths. Truth plus error is the most dangerous form of error.

If you have a question or comment about something here or have heard something somewhere and you aren't sure if it's true, even if you flat out disagree with me, please don't hesitate to contact me (comments or e-mails are welcome). I'm always looking to keep my information accurate, helpful, and up-to-date.






Myth # 1: The BLM roundups are not inhumane and the public is free to view them.

Roundup photos are available at http://savethemustanghorses.blogspot.com/p/photos-of-blm-roundups.html

BLM roundups are very inhumane. The lie is that the horses are always herded slowly and gently, but the truth is that the BLM only allows the public to view a few roundups (roundups which are carefully staged). The BLM often restricts or denies the press and public access to roundups. Luckily, a few people (many of whom are undercover BLM employees) are able to record and photograph most of these “unobserved” roundups and their aftermath. “I’ve seen broken legs,” says wild horse observer Laura Leigh, standing outside a BLM holding facility in northern Nevada. “I’ve seen legs ripped up by barbed wire. I've seen horses kicked in the head. I’ve seen animals dragged by the neck with a rope. I’ve seen a helicopter hit horses.” To quote an eye-witness to the 2006 Sulphur round-up in Utah: “In all my life I have never seen such blatant abuse and neglect and just plain lack of compassion for horses, or animals in general for that matter.” "I'm assured repeatedly [by BLM veterinarians] that these horses are cared for," said wild horse advocate Elyse Gardner. "So why does it seem that it is the public observers that continually need to bring so many overlooked injuries, illness or orphaned foals to the attention of the BLM?"

Trauma, injuries, abortions, and death are common results of BLM Mustang and burro roundups (or “gathers,” as the BLM calls them). There is nothing humane about driving entire herds (including newborn foals) at the speed of a flying helicopter over land deemed too rough for vehicles. (Read Wild Horses the Stress of Captivity, a report by Dr. Bruce Nock.) The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) claims a mortality rate of 0.5% in connection with roundups. They are able to claim such a low mortality rate because they attribute to natural causes most injuries/deaths sustained during roundups (e.g., Paymaster, NV, 2006: although 21 horses were euthanized on site, the BLM claimed a zero mortality rate for the round-up). Foals born in the corrals are not counted in BLM records. So, if the foals die or are aborted, the BLM doesn't record it. The BLM may record “Gather-related deaths: 0”, when in fact, many horses could have died, they were just foals. Few deaths are ever deemed by officials a result of roundups, and injury statistics are often simply omitted. Reports of animals that later have to be euthanized due to injuries sustained during capture are common. According to a Capture Status Report obtained via a Freedom of Information Act request, 12% of the Golde Butte burros rounded up in March of 2007 were dead within six months of their capture. Just over two months after the Calico roundup in Nevada ended in early 2010, 86 of the 1,922 horses captured had died, and an additional 40 heavily pregnant mares had spontaneously aborted.

The BLM pays the roundup teams $350 for each horse they bring in (dead or alive), so the pilots often go to drastic measures to capture as many horses as possible during each gather. It is not uncommon for contractors to drag a listless body into the roundup pen to collect their fee. Horses are killed and injured during the roundups. Foals are euthanized because they are driven so hard that their young hooves separate from the bone – an excruciatingly painful ordeal. Herds are driven across terrain deemed too rough for vehicles (including sharp rocks and vast lava beds). Such treatment can permanently damage a horse's knees and hooves. During the Calico Roundup of 2009 and early 2010, over 140 Mustangs were killed before they even reached the holding pens. After the roundup, many Mustangs died later in the corrals, bringing a total of 150 deaths. Horses seen galloping during a roundup are terrified wild animals that believe they are running for their lives. After roundups, almost all Mustangs suffer "capture myopathy" (a condition in wild animals triggered by the stress and anxiety of capture and confinement) to some extent. It has been documented that domesticated Mustangs have been known to react in complete, panicked terror at the sound of a helicopter passing overhead. I am aware of at least one young girl killed when the Mustang she was riding panicked as a result of such an incident. Many Mustangs suffer hearing loss after roundups.

Helicopter pilots sometimes swoop down low to nudge and/or hit animals that they feel aren't moving fast enough. Usually those animals are the old, sick, weak, or the very young of a herd. Because a helicopter's rotating blades pick up so much static electricity from the friction in the air, to touch a helicopter before it has been grounded will give you a huge shock. It can be so strong that it may feel like a lightning strike. Humans have been killed from such static discharges.

At the holding site, BLM makes liberal use of its euthanasia policy: horses with physical defects are often euthanized, including adults that had managed to thrive for years in the wild (e.g., White Mountain, NV, 2007: eight club-footed horses between the ages of 2 and 10 euthanized).

The roundup teams use cattle prods to terrify already terrified horses and burros to go into small spaces that their instinct tell them to stay out of. Once in the capture chute, the horses slam up against each other in their panic. If a horse happens to fall, it will most likely be trampled. BLM employees use whips with plastic bags tied to the ends to frighten the already stressed horses away from gates. As wild horses are driven into holding pens, closely-knit family bands are broken up; foals may be separated from their mothers, trampled, or sometimes, too exhausted to keep up with the herd, left behind to fend for themselves out on the range. The panicked herd stallions often fight each other in the small spaces, desperately trying to keep their mares together, therefore hurting themselves and others. They’ve broken their necks in the attempt to keep their family groups together. A stallion named Braveheart broke his neck trying to defend his herd from a BLM horse tethered outside his corral. Another, (a black or dark-colored stallion) got loose and nearly tore his leg off in his panic to get away. Such stories are not uncommon.

Once they are penned, much of the time the horses don't have adequate healthcare, and many fall ill. The BLM has openly admitted that they are currently holding approximately 50,000 Mustangs in captivity (far more than there are in the wild), and their money is running out. Last year alone, the cost for helicopters $29 million. The total cost of captive horse care was $80 million. Many captive Mustangs are in poorer condition than they were and would be in the wild, and some are starving because the BLM cannot afford to feed them enough.

During the Swasey Mountain (in Utah) roundup that started on February 11, 2013, the BLM began preparations for a roundup despite 16 inches of dense snow. On February 12, the temperature hovered just above zero degrees Fahrenheit. Later that day the wind picked up. Horses should never be worked hard in cold weather, as they can catch chills and suffer complications later. If things go wrong during a cold weather workout, your horse could very well end up dying. Still, even with the peak of the foaling season only two months away, the BLM insisted on running a roundup. The BLM barred the public and press access to the actual roundup the next day, February 13. The BLM told the public that the temperature was thirty-two degrees. Weather stations and channels broadcasted that the temperature was between fourteen and sixteen degrees. Thermometers read sixteen degrees in the roundup area. The BLM employees’ water bottles froze solid in their backpacks. Still, the BLM insisted that the temperature was thirty-two degrees or higher. Photographers were able to capture a few photographs of the horses after they were brought into the holding pens. The pens looked like they were on fire from the huge amounts of steam rising from the exhausted, sweaty horses. One cameraman said he thought his lens had fogged up before he realized it was steam from the horses. The BLM told the public that the steam rising from the Mustangs in the capture corral did not relate to the amount they were sweating, but if it wasn’t the Mustangs, where was the water vapor coming from? On February 14, the wild horse herds had to cut their way through deep snow and ice (sometimes chest-deep or deeper) to flee the helicopter that ran them at a steady gallop. Thousands of horses were removed during the Swasey Mountain roundup, and almost none have any chance of being adopted. Their future is dim.

The BLM has also run many secret roundups with heavy police presence to keep the public at bay. Most roundups, even if the press and public are denied access, are announced publicly. But occasionally the BLM will perform a roundup with no announcement. Naturally, because these roundups are secret, we have no knowledge of how humane they are, but logic dictates that if one has nothing to hide, why keep it secret? These roundups usually take place during the foaling season when mares are heavily pregnant, giving birth, and tending to newborn foals. The BLM has stated that they will never run roundups during the foaling season, and yet they run roundups during the foaling season without informing the public first. Terri Farely, author of the Phantom Stallion series, has taken the BLM to court multiple times over secret roundups being performed in her area of Nevada (near the Calico Mountains).











Myth #2: The BLM needs to round up (remove) Mustangs by helicopter or they will overpopulate.

In an area larger than the state of Delaware, BLM would allow only 861 - 1,165 Mustangs. This number is incredibly low, and, according to the National Academy of Sciences and many other wildlife biologists (none of which are biased from receiving pay from the BLM), is far below the natural grazing limit of the land. This abundance of food and no hunger causes the Mustangs to feel no need to limit their numbers, causing a bloom in the population levels. That is the natural cycle of all wild animals. When there is food, there are more animals. When food is scarce, births become rarer. While the number of Mustangs in the wild has been dropping due to unnatural removals, Mustang population rates have been growing at around 10 to 15 percent each year, and the roundups, which are not only putting a huge strain on national finances and space to house captive Mustangs, are merely removing genetic information from the herds, causing them to inbreed. The species springs back as it would after a natural disaster or plague. BLM removals and roundups are causing population growth, not reducing it.

The roundups are also extremely expensive (last year, it cost around $29,000,000), and then the captive horses must be cared for. It costs around $100,000 each day to feed the horses, and that money comes straight from American tax-payers. With the growing population rates caused by roundups, the BLM will require more and more roundups, and more and more space and care for the captive horses. Costs will be escalating.

A better, kinder, more financially responsible, and more efficient response would be in-the-wild management with the use of fertility drugs, fencing, and ending/restricting predator hunting or possibly releasing existing predators into the wild. The National Academy of Sciences advocates fertility control over removals. The NAS describes that the BLM’s current method of management is primarily helicopter roundups and removals, but describes how the removal method actually promotes population growth, thus causing more and more wild horses to be born every year (around 15% to 20% more every year.) In order to keep wild horses at their AMLs (appropriate management levels), the BLM is forced to remove more and more horses every year. Essentially, the BLM is fighting a losing battle that it’s only making worse by continuing roundups and removals. The BLM must provide housing and care for all the horses that it removes, and since the number of horses that need removing each year is increasing by about 15% to 20%, the cost of care for these captive wild horses is becoming increasingly expensive. The BLM pays for all of this with tax dollars. The NAS’s solution to this problem is to reduce the number of helicopter roundups done each year and to increase to use of fertility control drugs. The NAS names porcine zona pellucida (PZP) and GonaCon for mares and chemical vasectomy for stallions. These fertility control methods – called “on-the-range-management” – have been used on the wild horses of Assateague Island since 1988, have successfully kept the Assateague population at 150 animals, and are tried and true. The NAS does mention that it will be more challenging to manage a population of wild horses on the continent than it would be on a small barrier island. However, the BLM has the resources to perform yearly helicopter roundups, so they have the resources to dart mares from those helicopters.

The BLM's claims of massive wild horse populations are also questioned by many wildlife biologists. Here is Robert C. Bower's response to the BLM's "wild horse problem..."

In a recent article that was published in the Washington Post, under Health and Science, entitled “U.S. looking for ideas to help manage wild-horse overpopulation”, a plea was sent out by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), a plea that requested ideas as to how to manage the wild horse and burro population in the wild. This plea was reinforced by claims that the wild horse and burro population, on the western rangelands, was approximately 40,605 wild horses and or burros. Additionally it was stated that there would be at least a 15% to 20% annual population growth rate of these wild horses and that in 6 years, by the year 2020, that number will have grown to be about 145,000 wild horses and burros in the wild. Its claims also stated that contraceptive efforts had failed, and that the range lands could only sustain about 26,677 wild horses and or burros. The undying claims of the BLM are that it is, in its efforts, out to help maintain a thriving natural ecological balance. This is the motivation to justify its roundups of thousands of wild horses that it says are destroying the rangelands of the west. As a biologist, there is a scientific response to these allegations that the public needs to take into consideration before swallowing these claims of the BLM.
 There are numerous factors that govern population growth in the wild for wild horses and burros, or lack of population growth. The National Academy of Sciences did a study of the wild horse populations, using 8,764 wild horses, in the wild, as a basis for the following statistics. It found that 1st year mortality rates annually ranged between 14% and 50%. Beyond this, adult mortality was found to annually range between 5% and 25%. What this means is, that in any given year, equine mortality on the range lands would be anywhere between 19% and 75% of the total population of wild horses. I would ask that the reader to let these percentages sink in. This mortality occurs naturally, due to predators of the wild horses and burros, which do indeed exist, along with environmental and weather related factors, which also affect competitive grazers. In addition sex ratios were found to average around 55% female and 45% male. This must be considered as obviously only females can put a foal on the ground. This is something that the BLM statistics do not reflect, but have conveniently neglected in its population growth claims. The genders of foals must be taken into consideration, as not all foals are female, and only those that are females can begin to reproduce, but only after the 2nd year. Added to this are considerations of delayed implantation, when the gestation period of a mare actually extends, due to stressful conditions on the range. Spontaneous abortion also needs to be mentioned, along with selective breeding by the band stallions, whereby perhaps only one mare, if any at all, are bred, under harsh range conditions. It then must be stated that added to this natural inhibition are those artificial adjustments added by the BLM that only serve to encourage the extinction of these wild ones. The use of the PZP contraceptive is one, which has been found to inhibit reproduction in those mares that were treated, for up to 2 years, carrying with it other physiological side effects. After the roundups of the BLM, which have been very aggressive, and relentless, roundups of which this individual has both documented and videoed, sex ratios are adjusted to roughly 47% female to 53% male. This man made decrease in female density, along with the aggressive use of PZP by the BLM, have devastating effects on wild horse and burro populations. These only encourage annual reproductive rates that are far less than natural on range mortality. The result is diminishing numbers of wild horses and burros on the rangelands of the west. To further complicate population growth are the countless illegal killings of the wild horses, motivated by age old prejudices, most of which go uncaught. Also what must be included are the aggressive roundups of the BLM. All of these variables serve not only to disprove the astronomical population growth rates of the BLM but also overall numbers in the wild.
 The false allegations, by the BLM, that the numbers of wild horses on the range, could increase from 40,605 to 145,000 by the year 2020, a 6 year period, can easily be illustrated by a similar scenario. This occurred in the 2009/2010 Calico Mt. round ups, that occurred in northwestern Nevada. In this situation, according to the BLM, at the end of the 2004/2005 gather there were 575 horses total existing in the five HMAs making up what would be called the Calico Mt complex. That population of 575, according to the BLM, in just a 4 year period, had grown to 3055 horses. Of those 3055 horses and burros the BLM intended to gather 2,476 – 2,787 horses, then releasing up to 264. The sex ratio after the 2004/2005 gather, however, was reported to be only 47% female and 53% male, which means only 47% of those horses would be able to contribute to a population growth. Added to this, the PZP contraceptive had been administered, which was still in the experimental stage, and has been proven to disrupt the social structure of the wild horse and burro bands as well as to result in an increase of futile matings. Of those 47% mares, 239 were said to have been inoculated with this PZP contraceptive which has roughly a two year effect.
 Second, as stated earlier, it has been found that the minimum adult on the range annual mortality to be approximately 5%. This factor also was not included in the BLM’s calculations which further reduced the possibility of this meager wild horse population of 575 in reaching 3055 horses in just a 4 year period. Indeed, the number of horses that were rounded up, were only 1,992, at which point no other horses could be found. Yet calculating a population growth from 575 horses to even 1,992 horses in a 4 year period, including just a 5% annual mortality, 47% of the population being mares being able to put a foal on the ground, and eliminating 239 of that 47% for the first 2 years because of PZP, it would require a 125% annual reproductive rate to offset these variables to reach that number. Such reproductive rates do not occur in nature, which leads one to question or theorize exactly how those horses got out there!! To state that 40,605 wild horses could increase to 145,000 horses in just a 6 year period, while factoring in natural mortality rates along with all other natural variables, would require astronomical reproductive rates to offset those variables. Such reproductive rates do not and never will occur in nature. Indeed, using the BLM’s own population statistics, factoring in nature’s mortality, sex ratios, aggressive use of PZP, while subtracting wild horses that have been rounded up, the numbers of wild horses and or burros remaining in the wild are in the low teens, if that. Our wild horses and burros, existing in the wild, are close to extinction!
 In spite of the BLM’s assertions, that it is striving to maintain a thriving natural ecological balance, its methods and the manner in which they are being carried out, are anything but natural, nor do they bring about any balance. Indeed, it is by these very methods, that the BLM uses, that the wild horses and burros, along with other aspects on the range are being thrown out of balance. Nature, through its own mechanisms, has been maintaining what the BLM have termed, a thriving natural ecological balance, for thousands of years, without the artificial methods of mankind. Indeed, it is mankind’s incessant belief that he must manage nature, which has thrown nature continually and consistently out of balance. This makes the wild horse and burro program of the BLM completely unnecessary. This program, however, is the very avenue by which the wild horses and burros will be raped from their legally designated lands, and nature destroyed.
 This brings up a vital question to the reader. With such factors as these existing, that govern wild horse and burros populations, along with the unnatural efforts of the BLM, that further degrade these same numbers, what are the true motivations of the BLM for distorting the numbers of wild horses and destroying these vital natural resources to true ecological balance? The answer lies partly in livestock, mining, and energy interests. The cow flop gets deeper when one realizes that in order for the BLM to acquire continued and increasing appropriations from congress, it has to justify the appropriations that it has already been getting. Appropriations means not only a continued Wild Horse and Burro Program, but a lot of money to be made, not just for BLM employees but contractors that the BLM employs in the roundups, like the Cattoors, and Sun J, helicopter contactors. This translates to a situation where the BLM has to somehow convince the public and congress, by whatever means possible, that the wild horses and burros are breeding like rabbits, and that the numbers are way out of control. Here comes the deceit and distortion of numbers. Somehow the public, for the most part swallows what the government is saying, hook line and sinker, without seeking the truly scientific truth, a truth which is for the most part grade school science. For example, the BLM could say that the appropriate management level of wild horses in a certain area is only 600 wild horses. In truth there may be only 300 wild horses there, but the BLM, to justify removal, continued appropriations, and appeasement of the livestock industry, will claim 900 horses existing in the area. It will in turn say we need to round up 300 horses to bring the numbers back to its appropriate management level of 600, (see article entitled “The Unnatural Concept of the Appropriate Management Level”). It will roundup 300 horses, zero out the area to make it available for the livestock industry, and still claim that there are 600 wild horses existing in that area. This is a simple illustration but it is a tactic of the BLM. This further translates to a governmental conspiracy by our government against wild horse and burro populations, in the wild, (see books written by wildlife ecologist, Craig Downer, “The Wild Horse Conspiracy “, and “Wild Horses: Living Symbols of Freedom”).
 In conclusion, the wild horses and burros are a vital component to ecological balance out on the range lands of the west, the benefits of which are innumerable as opposed to cattle. The numbers of these beautiful animals must be dictated, however, by nature itself and not man, through its own mechanisms. Only in this manner will wild horse numbers be in balance with all other forms of wildlife, including those of the predators of the wild horses. The wild horses are just this, wild, and in the wild, no matter how harsh or how mild the conditions may be, is where their beauty and their benefits exist and can be experienced. The range lands that were once filled with vast numbers of wild horses, and other forms of wildlife, are now quickly dying due to the artificial efforts of our government. The rangelands, however, can easily sustain not only the wild horses and burros existing out there now, but also every one of those in holding facilities, which now number well over 40,000. The truth is that every one of those wild horses and burros in holding facilities, if released back to the areas from which they were taken, along with those in the wild, would help bring the balance back to the rangelands, a balance that is so very vital!

- Robert C. Bauer, Biologist, rcbauer7@gmail.com

Myth #3: Helicopter roundups are the only way to manage Mustangs.

This is simply a lie. There is no other way to put it. A few alternatives to helicopter roundups are, but are not limited to:

- Remotely-delivered fertility control – This is possibly the best solution, and could survive on its own if used correctly. Mustangs would not reproduce as quickly. Drugs such as Porcine Zona Pellucida (PZP) can be delivered remotely to mares in the form of a dart. The horses mustn't be rounded up or removed. PZP is also morally acceptable to all in that it simply prevents a mare from becoming pregnant instead of killing an unborn foal. Its effects also wear off over time, allowing a once-darted mare to become fertile again. This "reversibility" is very beneficial for the gene pool because all mares could potentially have foals, just not as many as they would naturally.
Since 1988, the wild horse population of Maryland’s Assateague Island has been successfully managed at 150 animals using the contraceptive vaccine PZP developed with the help of the Humane Society of the United States. Dr. Jay Kirkpatrick was assisting the BLM in implementing this non-intrusive contraceptive method across a growing number of herd management areas before his untimely death.
PZP  has proven very successful, is easy to administer (via remote darting of the mares) and does not disrupt the complex social structure of wild herds. A March 2004 USGS study found that $7.7 million could be saved annually through the use of contraceptive measures alone.

ECONOMICAL BONUS: Fertility drugs are far, far less expensive to create, obtain, and distribute than the costly roundup operation currently in progress. Also, it could help to generate jobs that many people can perform, seeing as the darter mustn't pay for years of flight training prior to being hired.

- Rounding up Mustangs on horseback – Mustangs would only be driven as fast as the saddle-horses can run. If the saddle horses can't take it, neither can the Mustangs. No, it's not a perfect solution, but coupled with others, it can be part of one (notice I listed many options). One con to this solution is that the land must be mapped out previously, but seeing as the BLM has access to helicopters that shouldn't be a problem. Another downside is that it poses a risk of injury to saddle horse and rider. Since the risk of injury is great enough, obviously horseback roundups could only be used as a supplemental option alongside a more powerful option, such as fertility control.

- Ending/restricting human hunting of predators or possibly releasing existing predators into the wild – Predators would help to naturally manage the Mustang population, therefore giving less need for roundups. Unfortunately, Mustangs' natural predators are hunted by trophy hunters and by ranchers to protect their livestock, and thus they are less effective at controlling Mustang populations than they could be. Predators have also been displaced from their natural habitats, which is causing an overpopulation of multiple herbivore species, most notably deer.

Mustangs and native wildlife were thriving before humans came and hunted and displaced their predators. By killing herbivores' natural predators, humans have hurt the ecosystems, causing wildlife, including Mustangs, to move into places where they didn't live before and/or to overpopulate.
One con for this is that the predators are dangerous to domestic animals such as cattle, sheep, domestic horses, and dogs. However, there are other, non-lethal methods of protecting livestock from large predators. In Namibia, large dogs are trained to live with and protect sheep and cattle from cheetahs. Hunting laws about predators make it legal to shoot a lion that gets on your property. If for some reason you can't shoot the lion, you can get help from the government. If someone’s going to plant himself in lion country, he’s going to have to deal with it. Killing off the native predators is not the answer. 

ECONOMICAL BONUS: Hiring rangers to inspect wildlife would be much less costly than the expensive roundup operation currently underway.

- Giving helicopter pilots a set salary – Instead of paying pilots for each horse they bring in, by paying them a set salary, pilots would be less apt to drive Mustangs beyond their limits and BLM could save money. ECONOMICAL BONUS: Instead of paying each pilot $350 for each horse, the general amount of money poured into roundups could very well be greatly reduced. All in all, the U.S. would save a bit of cash.

- Deducting from pilots/roundup employees’ salaries or firing employees if animals are injured during a gather – Mustangs would be treated with greater care and respect.

- Bait-trapping – Mustangs are lured by treats, food, or water and enter the corral at their own will. If the horses are truly starving, there will be no problem getting them into the pen. A con with bait-trapping is that predators such as wildcats like to prey on the captured horses, but a proper watch will prevent wildcat attacks. Currently, the BLM sets only one employee to guard the corral. It would be wiser to post two or more guards. That way, one can watch while the others sleep so he can frighten off at or kill any predator that gets too close. 

ECONOMICAL BONUS: Bait-trapping would reduce the need for helicopter roundups, which are incredibly expensive. It would also help to generate jobs for individuals who are willing to learn the ropes (no pun intended), instead of pouring huge amounts of money into a single man who already had enough money to afford helicopter flight training.

- More uses of Judas-horses during roundups – Mustangs follow the domestic horse instinctively and are less traumatized. Fortunately, the BLM already uses Judas horses quite often.

- Placing fencing or some kind of deterrent around the perimeters of HMAs (Herd Management Areas) --
While this would take a lot of effort and work to start up and a significant amount of work to maintain, it will help prevent wild Mustangs from roaming out of their designated lands and therefore reduce the need for roundups in general. In the long run it would most likely pay itself off. While this may not be needed for very large HMAs, it would be extremely beneficial for "checkerboard" lands (lands that contain one square mile of HMA next to one square mile of cattle graze, back and forth, and so on). Instead of forcibly removing entire herds and thinning the gene pool, Mustangs could be managed within their HMAs through remotely-delivered fertility drugs and/or the other alternatives I have described. Of course, the area enclosed must have a sustainable water source and must not block off migration routes for other land animals.

ECONOMICAL BONUS: Creating and maintaining the fencing would also help to generate jobs that the average laymen could perform, and by providing jobs may help reduce the dependency on government welfare and therefore take a piece of the load off the economy.

- Managing cattle and sheep ranchers as well as Mustangs – by returning to the Wild Horse and Burro Act, all the animals on public rangelands would be safer and more comfortable.

Myth# 4: The BLM prevents Mustangs from being sold to slaughter.

It is important to note that the BLM does not currently slaughter Mustangs itself (although it has done it in the past and is currently fighting for the right to do so again), as many claim it does. The market for Mustangs – even saddle-broken ones – is rock-bottom, and the BLM is running out of room to house them. As they keep bringing in more, they're forced to sell them off to anyone who will buy them.

Mustangs that go through their adoption program are fortunate to have a legal tie to the BLM until the BLM releases it. The owner can't sell the Mustang, he must meet certain regulations, and the BLM has the right to check up on the Mustang. This tends to rule out most bad owners.

Mustangs that go through the sales program, though, get none of these advantages. The horses are given to the highest bidder, and many go for dirt cheap, which makes them hot targets for the meat market. The owner only has to sign a contract promising that he won't sell the Mustang to slaughter. Promises are only as good as the person who makes them. 70% of all the Mustangs that go through the sales program are bought by one man, Tom Davis. He wants more because the BLM is only selling him "mere hundreds at a time." So far Tom Davis has refused to reveal where he sells all those horses to. When asked, he replies "it's none of your business."

The first Mustang costs $125 to adopt. After that they only cost $25. If you spent $25 to get the horse, you get a dollar for each pound of meat from the horse, and the horse weighs 600 –1,000 lbs., you have a considerable profit.

Recently the BLM has started a policy where one person cannot buy or adopt more than four Mustangs within a six-month period. It will be interesting to see how long and which facilities hold to this new policy. The down side of this policy is that the BLM still brings in as many horses as before, but now they can’t get rid of them as quickly. Where will these extra horses go?

Unfortunately, if the BLM continues to use removals and stockpiling as its main management method, it may eventually be faced with no alternative but to send many of its horses to slaughter. That is the price that may have to be paid for the BLM's negligence in managing wild horses.

Myth #5: Mustangs are destroying the North American environment.

Wild horses should not be used as scapegoats for range degradation that is in fact primarily caused by private livestock: for instance, environmentalists have determined that in Nevada, home of the vast majority of America's remaining wild horses, the herds have little impact on the ecosystem compared with the hundreds of thousands of cattle that also roam the Nevada range. The Western Watersheds Project acknowledges that "the main cause of degradation of public lands in the arid west is livestock use and not wild horses."

The Wild Free-Roaming Horse and Burro Act recognizes free-roaming Mustangs as an "integral component of the natural system." It means that horses can only be removed from public lands if it is proven that they are overpopulating or are causing habitat destruction. The Act further mandates that the government "maintain specific ranges on public lands as sanctuaries for their protection and preservation."

In order to remove Mustangs from public lands to make way for cattle and oil drilling, and to fund the few families who are contracted millions to round up the horses, the BLM has made claims that wild horses are destroying natural habitats, competing for grazing lands, and overpopulating. But reports by the General Accounting Office and the National Academy of Sciences dispute such claims: BLM has never presented any evidence that horses destroy habitat, and the NAS in particular delivered a scathing critique of the BLM's outdated methods of determining wild horse populations. In fact, reducing horse populations in a given area has had negligible effect on range conditions: after massive wild horse roundups, herd areas show little or no improvement, especially in instances when cattle numbers remain the same (or increase). This means that wild horses are not the cause of habitat damage.

In stark contrast with BLM’s assertions, scientific studies have shown that Mustangs actually benefit the North American environment in numerous ways. Arguably the most important way that free-roaming horses help protect their environment is by combating cheatgrass, an invasive species of plant: https://www.usu.edu/weeds/plant_species/weedspecies/cheatgrass.html . Cheatgrass is native to North Africa, which is also where the horse species Equus caballos is thought to have originated. One could say that horses are cheatgrass's natural predator. It came to North America during the mid to late 1800's amid grain and straw packing materials. It arrived several centuries after Mustangs arrived, so its presence in North America cannot be blamed on Mustangs, as anti-Mustang people often claim. Fortunately for North America, horses enjoy eating cheatgrass, especially during early spring when the blades are tender, and (most importantly) before it's had a chance to develop seeds. Mustangs destroy the plants before they create seeds, thus preventing them from propagating. Vegetation also seems to thrive in some areas inhabited by horses (perhaps because horses combat an invasive species of plant?), which may be one reason the Great Plains were once a "sea of grass." Since that time, Mustangs have had their population reduced by about 98%. Generally, range conditions in steep hilly areas favored by horses are much better than in lower areas frequented by cattle. In addition, the horse’s digestive system does not thoroughly degrade the vegetation it eats. As a result, it tends to “replant” its own forage with the diverse seeds that pass through its system. This unique digestive system greatly aids in the building up of the absorptive, nutrient-rich humus component of soils. This, in turn, helps the soil absorb and retain water upon which many diverse plants and animals depend. In this way, Mustangs are also of great value in reducing dry inflammable vegetation in fire-prone areas, such as the invasive plant species cheatgrass. Back in the 1950s, it was primarily out of concern over brush fires that Storey County, Nevada, passed the first wild horse protection law in the nation.

Horses have proven useful to other species they share the range with. In winter months, they break through even deep crusted snow where the grass cannot be seen. They also open up frozen springs and ponds, making it possible for smaller animals to drink. During the historic blizzard of 1886, hundreds of thousands of cattle were lost on the Plains. Those that survived followed herds of mustangs and grazed in the areas they opened up. 

Another positive effect of wild horses on biodiversity was documented in the case of the Coyote Canyon horses in the Anza Borrega National Park (California). After wild horses were all removed from the park to increase bighorn sheep population, bighorn sheep mortality actuality skyrocketed: mountain lions, formerly wild horse predators, compensated the loss of one of their prey species by increasing their predation on the other available species: bighorn. Ironically, anti-Mustang groups claim that Mustangs are causing a drop in bighorn and pronghorn populations, due to the fact that both bighorns and pronghorns have been observed waiting for horses to finish drinking before they drink. The problem with the “drinking hole wild horses causing mass sheep and antelope extinction” argument is that, first of all, bighorn sheep and pronghorn are not threatened in the least bit. They're listed as "least concern: population stable." Horses aren't causing them any trouble. The sierra bighorn (Ovis canadensis sierrae), which is a subspecies of the bighorn sheep species (Ovis canadensis), is endangered, but due to hunting and habitat loss, not from waiting a few minutes at a watering hole. Also, waiting a few minutes for a herd of horses to finish drinking is not causing any sort of die-off among bighorn and pronghorn. Unlike cattle, which will stand in a watering hole all day long, wild horses are constantly on the move. They generally do not stay in an open, vulnerable place like a watering hole for longer than half an hour, if that. Most leave after a five-minute drink. It's also well-known that horses will wait for other large herbivores to finish drinking as well. That's how wild animals interact.

In the past, both bighorn sheep and pronghorn were threatened, both due to hunting and human encroachment. Bighorn sheep were victims of hunting, mostly, whereas pronghorn were prevented from reaching their migration routes because of (you guessed it) cattle. Cattle ranches erect barbed wire fences around their land, and pronghorn couldn't get through. But thanks to kindly ranchers making "wildlife-friendly" fences that have a smooth wire along the bottom rather than a barbed one, pronghorn can now slip under and get where they need to go. Things aren't perfect for either of these species, but they're much better off than they were a few years ago, and wild horses had nothing to do with the problems or the solutions.

The main cause of habitat degradation to North America is cattle and sheep, not Mustangs. Cows graze within a mile of water, often standing in it until the water is so soiled it’s unusable for some time, while wild horses are highly mobile, grazing from five to ten miles from water, at higher elevations, on steeper slopes, and in more rugged terrain. Cows have no upper front teeth, only a thick pad: they graze by wrapping their long tongues around grass and pulling on it. If the ground is wet or loose (such as if they have been walking over it for days), they will pull out the grass by the roots, preventing it from growing back. Horses have both upper and lower incisors and graze by "clipping the grass," similar to a lawn mower, allowing the grass to easily grow back. Horses and burros also have solid hooves which don’t tear apart the earth nearly as much as a cow’s cloven hoof. A congressionally-mandated study by the National Academy of Sciences found that wild horse forage use remains a small fraction of cattle forage use on public ranges. Domestic cattle and sheep number around 4 million on public lands. They outnumber Mustangs 50 to 1 in most states, and 200 to 1 in others. That's 3 million more than there ever were of Mustangs on those same lands, and 160% more than the modern Mustang population. The huge cattle and sheep populations have pushed out native wildlife and Mustangs, displacing wildlife and causing them to live in and eat plants that are unnatural for them to eat. Although cattle are rotated seasonally, there are still millions on the land at any given time. Even when a space of land is evacuated, it is typically so run-down that wildlife do not move back into it. Thus, cattle move back and keep the land as their own. It's not logical to ignore the more abundant, newer, non-native animal and choose to accuse the rarer non-native animal that has lived in North America for hundreds of years longer, and also lives in populations much, much smaller than it used to, back when the ecology of the land was relatively harmonious. Since Mustang populations are lower than they ever have been, it's not logical to pin the blame on them.

In 2001, a team of Russian scientists, part of a cooperative venture with the United States, came to study the effects of grazing animals on riparian areas in Nevada. They tested streams for nutrients and examined the desert and Sierra to learn techniques to improve the environment of their homeland. The scientists found that cows, which tend to camp around water sources, cause more damage to the stream banks than wild horses, which tend to drink and move on: "When we saw horses drinking from creeks, we didn't see much impact except for hoof prints. The water looked clean, had good overhanging branches and there was no sign of erosion on the banks. There was an abundance of insects and animals, including frogs and dragonflies and water-striders." Areas extensively used by cattle had fewer nutrients in the water and showed signs of bank erosion and other damage, their study concluded.

The fact that horses wander much farther from water sources than many ruminant grazers adds to their efficacy as a fire preventer. Their tendency to range widely throughout both steep, hilly terrain and lower, more level areas, while cattle concentrate solely on lower elevations, also explains why horses have a lesser impact on their environment than livestock: when one looks at a boundary fence where horses range on one side and cattle range on the other, the horses’ side typically reveals about 30% more native grasses. Their nomadic grazing habits cause horses to nibble and then move to the next bunch of grass, so as to not overgraze. This is why horse range is seldom sparse unless the horses' natural grazing patterns are disrupted by human interference, mostly in the form of fencing.

Myth # 6: The BLM rounds up Mustangs because they are all starving.

This issue is three-fold, so let's examine each part in detail.

Are Mustangs starving?

In general, no.

The idea that all Mustangs are starving is a well-believed lie propagated by the BLM to rally people to their cause. The truth is that the majority of Mustangs are not starving and many are fat. Despite federal protection, free-roaming horses have been relegated to the most inhospitable areas of the range, which is why a few herds are starving. Still, they have adapted and survived. Wildlife biologists in Mustang areas frequently photograph and watch Mustangs. They say that the majority are in good condition (they are not starving) and there are always fresh horse hoof prints around their waterholes (they are not dehydrated.)

The few Mustangs that are starving are starving because their food and water has been fenced off for cattle. Many HMAs and other wildlife reserves are placed on inhospitable and infertile land, often with little to no water, and the rich, healthy land is given to cattle. With few to no natural predators (due to hunting by humans,) Mustangs in such places are known to overpopulate easily, just like deer and various native wildlife. Unlike deer, Mustangs do not have a hunting season by humans. Thus, they end up breeding until there are too many for the infertile land to sustain. They end up going hungry. As such, those particular herds need more management than herds on suitable HMAs.

The BLM, ranchers, and anti-Mustang groups use these select starving herds as "proof" that all Mustangs in the wild are starving to death, and they claim that wild horse advocates are ignoring the fact that these herds are starving. This, of course, is ludicrous. The fact that a few herds are starving does not mean that all herds are starving. There are starving people in the United States. Does that mean everyone in the United States is starving? Of course not. Wild horse advocates are completely aware of these herds, and we have nothing against removing and/or relocating them in order to help them. We just want it to be done humanely.

Should we remove starving Mustangs or should we bring food to them?

It's best to remove them, or to relocate them or hold them until the land recovers, and then to release a small number back into the wild to be managed so that they don't overpopulate again. It's not wise to feed them in the wild or their populations will continue to grow and they will require more and more feed each year.

When a group of Mustangs rises above its AML (appropriate management levels), this means there are too many horses in that area and that they need to be removed, otherwise they will starve and cause significant environmental damage. The problem with the BLM's current management method is that, instead of removing the overpopulated herds, the BLM steps up roundups of all herds. In the end, it can take 1-2 years to get the overpopulated herd back down to its AML, but usually takes far longer. The answer is obviously not "more roundups everywhere," but rather "more removals where they are needed." In order to effectively manage wild horse populations, the BLM must manage herds individually, not nation-wide. When a herd needs help, help them, not a herd in another state. Removing herds that don't need help only damages the gene pool. Healthy herds would be better helped through preventative measures, such as fertility drugs.

There is more than enough public land to comfortably house all the Mustangs and an appropriate number of cattle. At the time being cattle outnumber Mustangs 50 to 1. There are currently more than 3,000,000 beef cattle on public grazing lands, around 1,000,000 sheep on publics grazing lands, and fewer than 25,000 Mustangs on all American wild lands combined. Grazing on public lands is a privilege, not a right, and can be taken away. But while Mustangs are being squeezed out of their legal lands and managed to extinction, no one is managing the ranchers. Cattle are rotated, but the land is so run down that wildlife rarely ever return to it during its vacant periods, if wildlife return at all. On top of that, cattle that share land with Mustangs provide only 3% of the beef that America uses.

Occasionally large-scale natural disasters such as droughts and floods will take away graze or water from healthy herds and an emergency gather needs to take place, but that’s relatively rare.

Do helicopter roundups prevent starvation?

No. Helicopter roundups cause overpopulation, and therefore starvation. Let me explain:

The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) recently conducted a study on the BLM's Wild Horse and Burro Program. They found that the majority of the program's resources (over 70%) is being funneled into helicopter roundups and stockpiling Mustangs, all at the expense of taxpayers, and less than 6% is being used for on-the-range management, which includes fertility control. They also found that Mustang populations were growing at an average of 15% - 20% each year. This means that every year, the BLM would have to remove 15% - 20% more horses than they had to the year before if they want to keep population levels the same. The cost for helicopter roundups and holding horses in captivity is already incredibly expensive, so what will it be like if more and more horses must be removed each year?

After several years of study, the NAS concluded that removals were the cause of this massive population bloom. Instead of simply reducing the number of horses being born, the BLM drastically removes massive numbers of horses every year, thus causing the horses to reproduce faster and faster with every roundup, until they reach the point where the BLM can no longer manage them, and they overrun the land and starve. After each roundup, the Mustangs spring back as they would after a natural disaster or a plague.

To manage horse populations without periodic removals, the NAS declared that widespread and consistent application of fertility control would be required. Three methods in particular -- porcine zona pellucida (PZP) and GonaCon™ for mares, and chemical vasectomy for stallions -- were identified as effective approaches. Fertility control would not cause dramatic decreases in population, but would rather keep populations at a steady level which could be monitored by the BLM and wildlife biologists.

“The committee recommended these approaches based on the evidence of their efficacy with other [horse] populations, notably the horses on Assateague Island,” said Guy Palmer, a veterinarian with Washington State University and chair of the study committee.

More information: dels.nas.edu/resources/static-… 

If a particular herd is starving and must be removed, the most humane way to do it would be bait-trapping. If the horses are starving, they will most definitely walk into a trap (such as a large corral) to eat hay (or other food) and water. They need not be chased and traumatized by helicopters to end up in the same corral. Bait-trapping is a quieter, less expensive way to do the same thing as a helicopter roundup. However, if the BLM is performing an emergency gather, be it through helicopters or bait-trapping, all horses must be removed from that area, and cannot be returned until the land has recovered and the horses have been treated with fertility drugs. Once things are back under control, a small number of fertility-drug-treated horses can be released into the recovered land and can be managed using the NAS's methods.

Myth #7 : Mustangs are the same as Brumbies, Chincoteague Ponies, etc. / Mustangs are not a breed of horse.

Anti-Mustang groups openly claim that Mustangs, Brumbies, Chincoteague Ponies, Sable Island Ponies, etc. are all one breed of horse and that their ecological impacts are identical. Mustangs have their own distinct, testable DNA. In fact, the BLM hires veterinarians to perform DNA blood tests on almost all the horses they bring in in order to verify that they are Mustangs as opposed to horses that escaped from neighboring ranches. Mustangs, Brumbies, and Chincoteague Ponies can actually be separated out by their DNA, and are therefore not the same breed. This is because their ancestries are different. Mustangs are descended from Andalusian, Lusistano, and other Spanish breeds brought over by Spanish explorers. Brumbies are descended from English breeds such as Thoroughbreds. Chincoteague Ponies are most likely descended from a few stray farm horses turned loose by English settlers (the wrecked Spanish galleon tale, although enjoyable, is most likely false), which were later enhanced with Arabian blood when the public took an interest in the ponies. All three have different ancestries and distinct DNA. They are not the same.

 Anti-Mustang people make the claim that Mustangs are not a breed of horse based several things: first on the roots of the name "Mustang." Mustang comes from the Spanish word mesteño, which meant "stray" or "wild." Anti-Mustang groups claim that because "Mustang" means "wild," then any horse or pony that lives in the wild is a Mustang. According to that logic, any horse that runs fastest for a quarter or a mile is a Quarter Horse, any horse that was born in Arabia is an Arabian, any horse that lives in a village is a Shire horse, any horse bred by a person named Morgan is a Morgan horse, any horse born near the Caspian sea is a Caspian pony, any horse bred by a Native American is an Appaloosa, any horse that comes from Tennessee and can walk is a Tennessee Walker, any horse bred to be ridden with a saddle is a Saddlebred, any "standard" horse is a Standardbred, etc. This is not logical. The origin of a horse breed’s name does not define everything about the current horses listed under it.

I once came across a young woman who said this: "To put it simply, any old horse wrangled from the wild in the west can be branded a mustang even if it was a horse that escaped from a neighboring farm." This is simply not true. That horse may be branded a Mustang, but that does not mean it is a Mustang. It is still whatever breed it was when it escaped. Its DNA and/or heritage did not change. Remember: The BLM actually performs DNA tests to avoid that exact problem. The same young woman went on to say this: "I even browsed a coffee table book about horses while at the doctor's office and it had this to say about mustangs: 'Today, most Mustangs are small, hardy little horses with little to no breed standard.' This would seem common sense, but unfortunately some horse activists are too stubborn to accept this known fact." Now, as coincidence would have it, I happen to know what book this member is referring to. I happen to own it. It's titled Spirit of the Horse and is written by Bob Langrish and Nicola Jane Swinney. I notice the young woman conveniently left out the title and the authors of the book, probably because she's aware that the quote she took from it was taken completely out of context and the very same sentence she quoted disproves her point. Her point is that Mustangs are not a breed because no two Mustangs are the same in any way other than being of the same species (a breed standard defines what similarities a breed of animal must have). This is the quotation in full (it is a caption for a photograph of Mustangs in a corral): "The wild Mustang of the United States is a real "melting pot," with little to no breed standard - they can be any color but are all hardy, with hard feet and a tough constitution." You'll notice that the DeviantArt member left out any part that praises Mustangs, as well as the part that defines the breed standard. The book also has this to say later on in the section on Mustangs: "At the beginning of the twentieth century, numbers of wild horses in the USA varied from an estimated one million to two million." The book repeats this two pages on in another photograph caption: "At one time, there were thought to be anything between one and two million Mustang, but their numbers decreased to an estimated twenty thousand left in the wild." The young woman in question vehemently opposes the idea that there have ever been 1 million or more Mustangs in the wild, so why does she quote a book that contains what she believes to be false information? Either she did not read the book and is therefore talking about something she doesn't know about, or she doesn't care about the validity of what she's saying, and will post whatever quote appears to fit her agenda. This type of illogical behavior is very typical among anti-Mustang individuals.

Anti-Mustang groups’ second basis for their claim that Mustangs are not a breed is based on the fact that Mustangs have a very mixed heritage. However, many American horse breeds, such as the Quarter Horse, the Appaloosa, and the Paint Horse, are some of the most recognized breeds of horses in the world, and are all direct descendants of Mustangs. If Mustangs are too mixed to be a breed, then therefore so are Quarter Horses, Appaloosas, and Paint Horses. Quarter Horses were created by "crossing English horses with Native horses." That's what the original documents say. We know the "native" horses must have been Mustangs (since Mustangs were the only horses that would have appeared to be native to the U.S. at the time), and we've assumed the "English horses" were Thoroughbreds, although we don't know for certain. Appendix Quarter Horses are modern Quarter Horses crossed with modern Thoroughbreds. Appaloosas are descendants of spotted Mustangs bred by Native Americans near the Palouse River (hence their name.) Paint Horses were developed from a base of spotted horses with Quarter Horse and Thoroughbred bloodlines. All these breeds have the same mixed heritage as Mustangs, and are some of the most recognized breeds in the world. For anti-Mustang individuals to say that Mustangs are not a breed, they must also make the claim that Quarter Horses, Paint Horses, and Appaloosas are not breeds. Not all horses on the range are "pure" Mustangs, though, because every now and then a horse from a nearby ranch escapes and intermingles with the herds. Probably the only pure Mustangs are Kiger Mustangs, Cerat Mustangs, and the like.

While I have not studied the stud books of all nations regarding Brumbies, Chincoteagues, Sable Islands, and others, I have studied Mustangs extensively and they are most certainly their own distinct breed, having been officially recognized worldwide as "Mustangs," and sometimes "Horses of the Americas," with various breeds such as "Nokotas" as sub-breeds. C'est la vie. They are a breed. The truth is that there is no agreed-upon definition of what a breed of horse is. Merriam-Webster dictionary has this for a definition of a breed: "a group of usually domesticated animals or plants presumably related by descent from common ancestors and visibly similar in most characters." (www.merriam-webster.com/dictio…)  Mustangs fit that description. They are descended largely from domesticated Spanish horses brought to the Americas and also from horses owned by American settlers. They were bred by Native Americans and American settlers to have the characteristics they have today. And yes, they do have characteristics, as much as anti-Mustang groups try to fight it. Most Mustangs are of a light horse or Warmblood type. Feral horses that exhibit draft horse characteristics are kept on separate ranges. They are small, rarely reaching over 14hh, with thick, soft coats, thick manes and tails, they generally have short bodies and legs with wide, tough hooves. They are also extremely fast and have a lot of stamina for their small size. Many exhibit traits from their Spanish ancestry, such as Roman noses. DNA blood testing has revealed that in several herds, such as the Cerat and Kiger herds, the Spanish blood was not much diluted with blood from American settlers' horses. Many have blue eyes. So yes, if we are to go by the dictionary definition of a breed, Mustangs fit the definition. A breed of horse is just eventually accepted by breeders, or it is not. Breeders have accepted Mustangs. (www.livescience.com/27686-must… , www.horseoftheamericas.com/ , www.ansi.okstate.edu/breeds/ho… , horsebreedslist.com/horse-bree… , www.equinenow.com/mustangbreed….) Mustangs are generally listed as "Spanish Mustangs" or "Horses of the Americas" in directories, registries, and stud books, so if you are looking for strictly the word "Mustang," chances are you won't find it. Anti-Mustang groups are thus appealing to their audience's ignorance by claiming that Mustangs are not a breed. Also, Americans use the word "Mustang" very loosely. To most Americans, any horse that gets loose in the Western U.S. is considered a Mustang. However, that's not scientifically true. That horse is still whatever breed it was when it got loose.

 However, the lunacy in the argument that all feral and/or wild horses and ponies are the same stems largely from the claim that all of their ecological impacts are supposedly the same. Anti-Mustang groups will, no joke, tell you exactly that. The vast majority of their "sources" are articles and studies done on Brumbies and Chincoteague Ponies and they expect that to somehow be satisfactory proof that Mustangs are just as damaging. Anyone with a lick of sense ought to understand the fundamental flaw in their reasoning. Mustangs are a completely different breed of horse that lives in a completely different environment under a completely different set of circumstances. Even more so, Mustangs live on a completely different continent than any of those breeds, and in a completely different country than at least two of them! Sable Island Ponies live under Canadian jurisdiction and Brumbies live in Australia. Sable Island Ponies and Chincoteague Ponies live on small islands in the Barrier Islands chain along the coast of North America, not a large, continental grassland/desert region. Brumbies do live in a landscape somewhat similar to the Western United States, but the ecology of the lands is very different. Australian wildlife and plants are vastly different from North American wildlife and plants. Brumbies have no natural predators and are one of only a very few number of large herbivores. Mustangs have many natural predators and are only one of many species of large herbivores. What's more, there are far, far fewer Mustangs than there are Brumbies. Australia holds the largest population of feral or wild horses than any country on the planet. Mustangs are only one of several breeds and/or types of feral horses living in the United States. (North America is not home to any native free-roaming horses, but free-roaming horses in the U.S. that descend from feral horses include Mustangs (western U.S.), Chincoteague ponies (Assateague Island, Maryland), Cumberland Island horses (Cumberland Island, Georgia), Shackleford Banks horses (Shackleford Banks, North Carolina), Banker horses, (Outer Banks, North Carolina), and possibly a few others which are currently gaining the public spotlight.) The claim that there is no difference between Mustangs and any breed and or type or feral horse is thoroughly ignorant and illogical.

Myth #8: Mustangs have no natural predators.

There is a common misconception that wild Mustangs have no natural predators. This couldn't be farther from the truth. Mustangs' predators include, but are not limited to, cougars (mountain lions), various species of bears (grizzlies, black bears), wolves, coyotes, etc. Unfortunately, all these predators are hunted by humans and many, such as bears and wolves, have been displaced by human development, thus they're prevented from doing their job efficiently.

Let's look at each major North American wild horse predator in depth:

Wolves

Wolves have the potential to be Mustangs' chief predator. In Canada, Mustangs are frequently preyed on by wolves. They are pack hunters, and while they are individually too small to bring down anything other than a foal or an old sick adult, a pack of them can easily bring down a healthy adult, even if a few pack members are injured or killed in the process. They also naturally roam in the same areas that Mustangs do: Northwest plains and sometimes mountainous regions. Unfortunately, wolves in the U.S. have had their population and habitat dramatically reduced due to human development. Thus, wolf territories today generally do not overlap with wild horse territories, even though they used to. This is what the National Academy of Sciences has to say about wolves and wild horses:

    Wolves are quite capable of preying on equids. In southern Europe, equids constituted 6.2 percent of wolf diets (range, 0-24 percent) (Meriggi and Lovari, 1996). In Abruzzo National Park, Italy, horses constituted 70 percent of wolf diets; however, unguarded horses are commonly hobbled in that area to prevent long-range movements (Patalano and Lovari, 1993, cited in Meriggi and Lovari, 1996). In northwestern Spain, a population of free-ranging ponies is heavily preyed on by wolves (Lagos and Barcena, 2012). Foal survival rate was very low (0.41), and 76 percent of foal carcasses found were killed by wolves. Van Duyne et al. (2009) reported that wild Przewalski’s horse foals were killed by wolves in Hustai National Park, Mongolia, and cautioned that predation could influence translocation efforts. However, those horses are sufficiently vigilant to survive and reproduce, so perhaps they have not lost essential skills (King and Gurnell, 2012). Wolves in a multiprey system have been reported to prey on feral horses in Alberta, Canada. Webb (2009) reported that one of 36 kills by wolves included a feral horse. Webb (2009) located 192 ungulates that had been killed by wolves in 11 packs from 2003 to 2006. Some 7 percent were feral horses, and they made up 12 percent of the total biomass consumed (0.01 ± 0.02 feral horse/pack per day). Despite evidence that wolves prey on equids elsewhere, the committee was unable to identify any examples of wolf predation on free-ranging equids in the United States.

This is basically the same thing that I've said. Wolves are capable of hunting horses, even adult horses, but in the U.S., they do not live in many of their native habitats. Wild horses still live in those habitats, but wolves no longer do, thanks to human involvement. In essence, wild horses are having the same exact problem that deer are having. Whitetail deer are overpopulating because their natural predator, the wolf, has been displaced by humans. The gray wolf in North America is not endangered, but it can't do its job effectively.

Cougars / Pumas / Mountain Lions

Cougars alone kill about half of Mustang foals born every year and are currently Mustangs' chief natural predator in the U.S., although wolves would be more effective if they were allowed to do so. The reason cougars are not as effective as wolves is because cougar and wild horse habitats to not generally overlap. Cougars are called mountain lions for a reason: they live in the mountains (wow, didn't see that one coming). Mustangs usually live on the plains and in desert areas. Some HMAs (Herd Management Areas) are in mountainous regions, and in those places, cougars do a pretty good job of keeping the wild horse population in check. Cougars enjoy horsemeat so much that they will often focus on hunting mainly horses to the near exclusion of other prey animals. Unfortunately, because cougars usually don't live on the open plains or in the desert, those Mustangs are rarely preyed on by cougars. The most common desert predator that poses any sort of threat to wild horses is the coyote, which I will cover later. Wolves live and hunt in open plains, but they've been pushed out of Mustang plains by human development (as I mentioned earlier). This is what the National Academy of Sciences has to say about cougars and wild horses:

    Most predation on free-ranging equids in North America has been attributed to mountain lions. That has been reported by Robinette et al. (1959) and Ashman et al. (1983). Berger (1983c) cited an unpublished report of 21 cases of mountain lion predation on free-ranging horses in the Great Basin; those deaths spanned more than 20 years and had negligible effects on population growth. Feral (but not free-ranging) horses constituted 11 percent of mountain lion diets in Alberta (Knopff and Boyce, 2009). Horses constituted 10-13 percent of adult male lion diets, but female lion diets were almost devoid of horses (Knopff et al., 2010). Overall, mountain lion predation on free-ranging equids in North America is, with few exceptions, considered uncommon (Berger, 1986). 

    One of the exceptions is the free-ranging horse population on the central California-Nevada border. Turner et al. (1992) examined foal survival rates in the area (the Montgomery Pass Wild Horse Territory managed by the U.S. Forest Service) because there was a ban on mountain lion hunting in California and low hunting pressure in Nevada that led to a high density of mountain lions. The study was conducted from May 1986 to July 1991 by examining the horse and mountain lion populations and documenting deaths of horses. The average annual cohort of foals over the 5 years was 32. The annual survival rates were calculated for foals (0.27), yearlings (0.95), and adults (0.96). From 1987 to 1990, 48 foals were lost; 58 percent were located as carcasses and 82 percent of those were killed by mountain lions. The authors concluded that mountain lion predation had a substantial effect on the demography of that free-ranging horse population. The study was continued, and Turner and Morrison (2001) used 11 years of data (1987-1997) to examine again the influence of mountain lions on the horse population in Montgomery Pass Wild Horse Territory. Their results supported the earlier work of Turner et al. (1992): mountain lions were responsible for the deaths of 45 percent of the foals that were born. Mountain lion predation was also hypothesized as a major factor in limiting horse population growth in an area of southern Nevada where they use high-elevation forested habitats in summer (Greger and Romney, 1999). Those habitats are excellent for mountain lions because of their broken topography.

By and large, research that has addressed the question of predation on free-ranging equids in North America has been limited to anecdotal observations and a few published papers, but at the time of the committee’s review, studies at the University of Nevada, Reno, that should provide more quantitative data were under way. The work in several mountain ranges of western Nevada was examining predation by mountain lions in multi prey systems in which free-ranging horses had various densities. Diet data were being obtained by using information from GPS-collared mountain lions to investigate predation events; more than 700 predation events had been investigated as of June 2012. Ten of 13 collared mountain lions that had access to free-ranging horses regularly consumed horses as prey. Horses were documented to have been consumed as prey by collared mountain lions in eight mountain ranges throughout the study area in western Nevada (Virginia, Pah Rah, Fox, Lake, Wassuk, and Excelsior ranges and Virginia and Smoke Creek Mountains). Preliminary data suggest that in that study area, where free-ranging horses are available as prey, more than 50 percent of the diet of collared mountain lions is made up of horses when diet data on individual mountain lions are pooled. Preliminary results suggest that mountain lions in that multiprey system are generalists at the population level but that some diet specialization occurs at the individual level: some lions select for deer where horses are more abundant, and some select for horses to the near exclusion of other prey items where mule deer, bighorn sheep, and domestic animals are present. There is also some evidence that the magnitude of predation on horses by mountain lions may be related to the density of free-ranging horses, greater predation on horses occurring where densities of horses are higher (Andreasen, 2012). 

    The potential for mountain lions to affect the sizes of populations of free-ranging horses in North America is limited by the fact that most HMAs are in areas that have few mountain lions. The ranges of mountain lions tend to be concentrated in forested areas and at higher elevations (Kertson et al., 2011) and in areas that have mountainous or otherwise broken topography with limited viewsheds. In contrast, many horse populations favor habitats that have more extensive viewsheds. Mountain lions are ambush predators and require habitats that provide opportunities for stalking or finding prey without being seen. Other predators, such as wolves, are more cursorial—capable of pursuing prey across open habitats. 

    That a large predator, when abundant, can substantially influence the dynamics of free-ranging horses is not surprising inasmuch as black bears (Zager and Beecham, 2006), mountain lions (Wehausen, 1996), and other predators (Ballard et al., 2001; Boertje et al., 2010) have exerted strong influences on ungulate populations. However, the influence of predation on horses in the western United States is considerably limited by a lack of habitat overlap both with mountain lions and with wolves. Another constraint is that among free-ranging horse populations, foals are the usual prey, and predation on adults has rarely been documented until the recent studies in Nevada. Population size is not affected as much by foal survival as it is by adult survival (Eberhardt et al., 1982), and foal survival is strongly affected by other variables (such as weather).

Bears

Bears are more than capable of killing an adult horse...if they can catch it. A single bear has a good chance of bringing down even a healthy horse, but the problem here is that horses are generally too fast for bears to catch. Again, wolves are the best candidate, seeing as they can chase a horse(s) and run it down. However, if a bear is lucky enough to catch a wild horse unawares, the bear has a very good chance of having a meal.

Coyotes

Coyotes typically prey only on young or very sick horses. They share territory with Mustangs. Unfortunately, they aren't big enough to take on a healthy adult, unless they hunt in a very, very large pack, which isn't likely. Coyotes are not a main natural predator of Mustangs, although a pack of them could kill a foal or a very weak adult.

Myth #9: Mustangs are not wildlife.

Mustangs are indeed wildlife. The current Nevada definition of wildlife states: “’Wildlife’ means any wild mammal, wild bird, fish,  reptile, amphibian, mollusk or crustacean found naturally in a wild state [,] and managed by the Department or the United States Fish  and Wildlife Service, whether indigenous to Nevada or not and whether raised in captivity or not.” (Section 1, NRS, 501.97). Mustangs fall into that category. They're not an endangered species (or even an endangered breed), but they are wildlife.








Myth #10: Mustang populations have never exceeded 40,000 animals in all of history.

To explain away the question of why Mustangs are causing more damage in a smaller population than they used to when they existed in a larger population, some anti-Mustang people simply deny that Mustangs have ever existed in populations larger than they do now. However, this is illogical and unscientific. Mustang populations numbered roughly 1 million (there was no exact count, but that's the commonly accepted number) in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Some historians believe there were over 2 million Mustangs in 1900, but that's doubtful. Most hold to the 1 million figure. Anti-Mustang groups will tell you that Mustang herds have remained stable at 40,000 for over 500 years (which, if that were true, how come those same people feel the need to "manage" current Mustang populations to keep them from "overpopulating"?). To keep a population steady for several centuries would require the capability to limit its own population, an idea which anti-Mustang groups vehemently oppose. This is what's known as a contradiction.

The argument that Mustangs have not exceeded 40,000 animals also directly contradicts the scientific fact that Mustangs' population growth rate is roughly 15% - 20% (www8.nationalacademies.org/onp…). This means that the Mustangs' population will double in around four to five years if not managed. Now, it's worth noting that the National Academy of Sciences found that the BLM is actually causing this enormous population growth rate by removing so many horses during their helicopter roundups (see previous link). The horses thus spring back as they would after a natural disaster or a plague. (Wild horse advocates thus believe that Mustangs must be managed, just not by helicopter. Fertility drugs are a very viable solution, but the BLM only allots 6% of its budget to on-the-range management.) Now, anti-Mustang groups do not believe the National Academy of Sciences when they say that the growth rate is caused by roundups, although they do believe the NAS's proposed growth rate (selective belief much?) Anti-Mustang people believe that the 20% population growth rate has always been in place. This would would mean that Mustangs have been increasing their population by 20% for the past 400 to 500 years. Even if we start with just two horses (which we know Mustangs didn't,) that's still a lot of horses. The BLM over-estimates the horse population, claiming that they have no natural predator(s), and that the horses double every 4 years. If this were the case, then there would be more horses then there are of the total human population on planet earth. Let's just take 12 horses alone and start from let's say 500 years ago (sometime after Columbus died.) Double those horses 125 times and the number will get extremely large. Even half that (doubled 62.5 times; 250 years,) is still too high for most hand-held calculators to show. The BLM's numbers do not hold up to simple arithmetic. Thus, one would think that anti-Mustang groups would be the first to embrace the late 1800s/early 1900s 1 million population number, possibly wanting to jack it up by several million, but no, they believe Mustangs have never topped 40,000. Anti-Mustang groups are thus contradicting themselves.

On their "Myths and Facts" page of their website, in an anti-Mustang attempt to discredit the possibility that there were 2 million Mustangs in the wild in 1900, the BLM quotes Frank J. Dobie, an historian, from his book The Mustangs (1952). This is what Dobie has to say: "All guessed numbers are mournful to history.  My own guess is that at no time were there more than a million mustangs in Texas and no more than a million others scattered over the remainder of the West."  Personally, I fail to see the logic in the BLM's posting of this quotation. In his own words, Dobie says that there were no more than 1 million Mustangs in Texas alone and no more than 1 million Mustangs in the surrounding states. No more than 1 million + no more than 1 million = no more than roughly 2 million. 1 + 1 = 2. This isn't rocket science. If this is the best evidence that anti-Mustang groups can cough up to support their claim, science and history are obviously not on their side. In the end, no matter what angle you look at Dobie's writings, there can be no fewer than 1 million Mustangs roaming the United States in the late 1800s/early 1900s. (www.horse-breeds.net/mustangs.… , academickids.com/encyclopedia/… , www.masterliness.com/a/Mustang…)

Now, this may be a bit of a rabbit-trail, but I need to mention that the BLM said this about Mustang population growth rates and "overpopulation": "When Congress assigned the BLM (and the U.S. Forest Service) to manage wild horses and burros in 1971 -- through passage of the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act -- the BLM's population survey methods indicated a total population of 17,300 wild horses and 8,045 burros, as compared to the 2014 estimated population of 40,815 horses and 8,394 burros." Once again, we see the BLM taking the population of Mustangs at the point of the signage of the Wild Horse and Burro Act, when Mustang populations were so low that they needed an official governmental act to save them, and declaring it to be an appropriate population maximum. The BLM and anti-Mustang groups believe that Mustang populations should be kept at crisis level, essentially, barely able to sustain themselves. And they believe that somehow, that crisis level is responsible for all of the damage caused to rangelands...

Myth # 11: If the BLM doesn’t round up the Mustangs, ranchers will shoot them.

First of all, it's illegal in the U.S. to shoot a Mustang. While this does not guarantee Mustangs' safety, it is a major deterrent for rancher violence

Furthermore, a lot of ranchers like Mustangs. There are ranchers who enjoy watching a herd or two wander around on their land, and there are ranchers who will shoot any Mustang that pops its head up within a 500-mile radius of his land. It’s not fair to ranchers to assume that all ranchers are the latter.

To drive the point home, the BLM’s removals of Mustangs does not prevent rancher violence. When a rancher wants to shoot a Mustang, it’s because that Mustang is on his land eating his grass. The rancher is allowed to frighten the horse off his land. If the Mustang comes back, by law, ranchers are supposed to contact the BLM (usually by phone) to alert them of the problem horse. The BLM is supposed to come to the rancher’s aid and remove and/or relocate the problem horse. Unfortunately, the BLM does this only rarely. Most of the time, the BLM uses that rancher’s call as an excuse to perform a massive removal of possibly hundreds to thousands of Mustangs very far away, often in another state. This does not help the rancher in any way. The BLM did this in 2016 with the Wyoming Checkerboard roundups, where the BLM performed massive removals in three separate HMAs because the Rock Springs Grazing Association had requested help with a few problem horses on private land several miles away.

In the end, BLM helicopter roundups do not prevent rancher violence to any large extent and merely reduce the genetic viability of Mustang herds in the wild.

Myth # 12: The BLM has to round up Mustangs by helicopter to boost America’s economy.

In-the-wild management would save millions of tax-dollars. BLM’s wild horse and burro budget was increased by 50% in 2001, then by another third in 2005, to fund a massive removal campaign. It costs as much as $3,000 to process a single wild Mustang for adoption, and that's assuming the horse gets adopted or bought straight away. It costs around $100,000 every day to feed and care for the captive horses. Last year alone, the cost for helicopter fees was $29 million. The total cost (including helicopter fees) was over $80 million. A 2004 USGS study found that in-the-wild use of fertility drug measures alone would save 7.7 million tax-dollars annually.

Myth #13: Mustangs will make Americans starve.

This myth (yes, this is something people actually say) comes from the idea that Mustangs are driving ranchers out of business and thus are taking away beef from Americans. The fact that Americans like beef is irrelevant to the Mustang debate considering that America throws away tons (using the actual measurement of weight) of beef every year. In addition, cattle on public lands shared with Mustangs contribute an estimated 3% of America's beef products. Wildlife and cattle are killed for nothing but rancher and government greed. Instead of pouring more money and land into the beef industry, the economic response would be to find an alternative outlet for ranchers seeking more profit.

Besides, Mustangs are not causing cattle to starve. There is more than enough public land to comfortably house all the Mustangs and an appropriate number of cattle. At the time being cattle outnumber Mustangs 50 to 1. There are currently more than 3,000,000 beef cattle on public grazing lands, around 1,000,000 sheep on publics grazing lands, and fewer than 25,000 Mustangs on all American wild lands combined. Grazing on public lands is a privilege, not a right, and can be taken away. But while Mustangs are being squeezed out of their legal lands and managed to extinction, no one is managing the ranchers. Cattle are rotated, but the land is so run down that wildlife rarely ever return to it during its vacant periods, if wildlife return at all. On top of that, cattle that share land with Mustangs provide only 3% of the beef that America uses.

Cattle ranching is declining on its own, not because of Mustangs.  The pro-ranching industry says that Mustangs and raising grazing fees will cost America jobs and cause Americans to go hungry, but is this really the case? This article says that it isn’t. The article describes how the majority of our beef products do not come from public lands ranching, even though ranchers hold such an enormous number of cattle on those lands (approximately 4,000,000.) Such a massive population of non-native animals is undoubtedly extremely damaging to the environment. On top of that, Americans are moving away from eating beef, which is causing cattle ranching to die a natural death. Grazing fees and wild horses are not causing it, the nation’s diet as a whole is. Americans are discovering that beef is not a sustainable diet. The article describes how every year there are fewer and fewer ranchers, and fewer beef producers in general nationwide. Cattle ranch-related jobs, ranching included, make up only around 5% of jobs in the Western United States. The article even goes so far as to say that completely eliminating the ranching industry in the West would not cause any significant employment impact or loss of food.

Myth #14: Being protected under U.S. law, Mustangs are safe from harassment, hunting, etc.

Mustangs are a protected animal by U.S. law, but that fact must be taken with a grain of salt. This depends on what your definition of "protection" is. Because their freeze brands distinguish them from other horses, Mustangs can't be slaughtered in the U.S. They have to shipped to Mexico and Canada where slaughter isn't as kind as it is in the U.S. Sometimes, though, the BLM obtains the right to slaughter Mustangs in the U.S., and I personally have mixed feelings about that (horse slaughter is humane when it's done legally in the U.S., but Mustangs shouldn't have to die in the first place).

Mustangs are protected from poachers and hunters. A person could be sent to jail or fined for harassing, hurting, or hunting wild Mustangs. However, the BLM does that day in and day out with roundups.

So yes, Mustangs are "protected," but the government itself abuses its power over them.