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EMERGENCY ALERT: Danger on Capitol Hill

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The following is from the American Wild Horse Campaign:

I’m sorry to have to give you some devastating news. In the wee hours of Monday morning, Congress released a 1,600+ page spending bill for 2017. Buried on page 804 is Section 116, which allows the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to strip wild horses and burros of federal protection and “immediately” transfer them to state and local governments for use as “work animals.”

But with no definition of work animal, and no limit to the number of horses and burros that can be transferred, this language could provide a back door route to killing thousands of these national legacy animals. Although Congress added language prohibiting commercial slaughter and putting some restrictions on “euthanasia,” signalling its intent to prevent the killing of healthy horses. However, ambiguities and loopholes in the language leave it open to abuse. Especially at risk are the older mustangs and burros, now protected under federal law. Under the language these majestic, elder animals could be killed simply due to “advanced age,” a term that is undefined.

We can’t let this stand…Congress should not be allowed to undermine the will of the American people and a unanimously-passed Act of Congress – the Wild Free Roaming Horses and Burros Act – through a last-minute spending bill. 

We have just hours to make our voices heard… Please click below NOW to call and send a message to key appropriators asking them to strip this devastating provision that could result in the killing of thousands – and potentially tens of thousands — of America’s cherished wild horses and burros.

If you do one thing for wild horses and burros, please do this now!

AWHP Update: Get Ready to Fight for Wild Horses & Burros!

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The following is an update from the American Wild Horse Preservation.

The fight over the future of America’s wild horses and burros will take place in Washington, DC this year as the Administration charts a new course for the Department of the Interior and Congress funds the government for the remainder of Fiscal Year 2017 and for Fiscal Year 2018. As an American citizen and taxpayer, YOU have both the right and ability to weigh in to influence these decisions.  When it comes to your elected officials in DC, YOU – as a constituent – are the best lobbyist for protecting wild horses and burros from mass roundups and slaughter.

Click below to learn how to best wield your power and get started today!

AWHP: We’re WILD About These T-Shirts!

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The following is from the American Wild Horse Preservation.

This week only…Get your limited edition ‘Keep Wild Horses Wild‘ T-shirt…and support our work! We are thrilled to announce that FLOAT is featuring these T-shirts, and for the next six days, will donate $8 for every shirt sold to the American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign.

SHOP today – there are lots of fun colors and styles to choose from! This is a great way to support our work to Keep Wild Horses Wild and free on the range and look fabulous! Don’t miss this opportunity!

 

AWHP Update: BLM Wants to Sterilize Blue Wing Horses & Burros!

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The following is an update from the American Wild Horse Preservation.

The Bureau of Land Management’s Humboldt River Field Office is accepting public comments on a Preliminary Environmental Assessment (PEA) to manage the federally protected horses and burros in the Blue Wing Complex in Nevada. The Complex, which includes the Kamma Mountains, Seven Troughs Range, the Lava Beds, Blue Wing Mountains, and Shawave HMAs, spans 2,283,300 acres (over 3,500 square miles!). Yet the BLM has set “Appropriate” Management Levels (AMLs) of just 333 to 553 wild horses and 55 to 90 wild burros for this entire area! At the upper population limit, that’s only one horse or burro per 3,551 acres!

Photo of captured Nevada wild horses by BLM

The BLM wants to drive the wild horse and burro population down to low AML in 20 years by implementing an unprecedented plan to sterilize 30 percent of these herds using highly controversial procedures that are untested in wild free-roaming horse herds. The BLM’s plan does not disclose when and how many roundups will occur, how many wild horses and burros will be permanently removed, when and how many mares and jennies will be treated with fertility control or spayed, or when and how many stallions and jacks will be gelded.

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For more details on the plan, please click here.

Now is the time take a stand against this BLM proposal that will expose wild horses and burros to this dangerous experiment that is thinly disguised as a management plan. Please personalize and submit the sample letter below to demand fair treatment of wild horses and burros in Nevada!

Please visit the link below for the opportunity to submit your own letter and stand against this injustice. The comment deadline is February 10, 2017.

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AWHP Update: ❤ Love Conquers All ❤

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The following is an update from the American Wild Horse Preservation.

As Americans, we are united in our love for freedom and our love for our national symbols of freedom:  America’s mustangs.

Is love enough to save these cherished animals? It will be, if we turn our love into action!

Valentine’s Day is two weeks away, and we have a great way for you to show your love and act for wild horses and burros!

For the next ten days, you can donate to support our work and dedicate your gift in honor of a loved one.

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For all donations $25 and over, we’ll send your special someone a postcard with the beautiful image above by esteemed wild horse photographer Kimerlee Curyl.

Your support will help fund our legal, legislative and grassroots programs to protect wild horses and burros during this most dangerous time. The threat of mass roundups and slaughter is real. The new Congress and Administration will determine their fate. 

Will love save our mustangs? It will, if we harness love into action, because we have the power of the people on our side!

Thank you sincerely and Happy Valentine’s Day from all of us at AWHPC. We are so grateful that you are part of our herd… …together we will prevail for our cherished mustangs and burros.

The AWHPC Team

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Tell Congress to Ban U.S. Horse Slaughter & Export Once & For All!

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The following is an update from the American Wild Horse Preservation.

America’s horses need your help. Over 100,000 horses each year are shipped across the border and are brutally slaughtered. The threat of slaughter for America’s wild horses is real. The SAFE Act would protect America’s horses by banning horse slaughter in the U.S. and prohibiting the transport of American horses to Canada and Mexico for slaughter. It was reintroduced with bipartisan support in the House of Representatives last week. Your support is needed for this important legislation. The lives of hundreds of thousands of horses — both domestic and wild — are at stake, so please take action today!

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Neighbors Fighting to Save Wild Horses Need Help!

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The following is an update from the American Wild Horse Preservation.

For decades, community groups have enjoyed and worked to protect the cherished wild horses that live in and around the Pine Nut Mountains Herd Management Area (HMA) in northern Nevada. But now the beloved Pine Nut horses are threatened by a Bureau of Land Management (BLM) plan to round up 500 of 579 of the mustangs living there! 

unnamedThese neighbors and the horses they love need our help today! Please weigh in against a devastating massive roundup and ask BLM to work with the local community to implement a birth control program for humane, in-the-wild management of the Pine Nut wild horses.

 

AWHP Update: Zeus

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The following is an update from the American Wild Horse Preservation.

Dear Meredith,

This proud stallion we call Zeus was photographed living wild and free five years ago in the Wyoming’s Great Divide Basin Herd Management Area. He was leading his family to water… standing guard over his mares and youngsters as they drank.

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Is Zeus still free? We don’t know. But he has a right to be. One of our toughest fights yet has been for the rights of wild horses to live wild and free in this area of land known as the Wyoming Checkerboard. This year, we delivered two important legal blows to the BLM’s plans to wipe out wild horses from this area to appease powerful ranching interests.

But the fight goes on. In 2017, the BLM will attempt to change land use plans to “zero out” (eliminate all wild horses from) the Wyoming Checkerboard.

Is Zeus still free? We don’t know. But he has a right to be.

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One of our toughest fights yet has been for the rights of wild horses to live wild and free in this area of land known as the Wyoming Checkerboard. This year, we delivered two important legal blows to the BLM’s plans to wipe out wild horses from this area to appease powerful ranching interests. But the fight goes on. In 2017, the BLM will attempt to change land use plans to “zero out” (eliminate all wild horses from) the Wyoming Checkerboard.

Please help stop this from happening.

Our legal team is ready to defend Wyoming’s wild horses from the BLM’s latest maneuvers to wipe them out. We’re also expanding our lobbying presence on Capitol Hill and continuing to build our grassroots army… With you help, the power of the people and the law of the land will prevail.

Zeus is a reason to give. The future of wild horses like Zeus depends on you.

In Freedom,

Suzanne Roy, Executive Director

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AWHP Update: Will You Fight For Them?

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The following is an update from the American Wild Horse Preservation.

Dear Meredith,

Wild horses and burros are under attack every day. We are fighting for them every day, and we want to show you every day this week exactly what we are fighting for.

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This valiant wild Wyoming stallion fought off five younger stallions to defend his beautiful snow-white mare, so heavily in foal she could barely move. Moments after the battle, he returned to his mare’s side and allowed her to rest her head on his back in the warm sun. 

Chivalry is not dead, but these wild horses and their way of life could be if we are not successful in stopping the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) from wiping out wild horses in the Wyoming Checkerboard to appease powerful ranching interests.

This year, we stopped a huge BLM helicopter roundup in this area. We scored two important legal victories that put the brakes… at least for now… on the BLM’s plan to eradicate wild horses from the Checkerboard. But the fight for the future of Wyoming’s wild herds goes on.

We call this beautiful stallion Galahad and his mare, Snow White. They are a reason to give. Their future depends on you. 

In Freedom,

Suzanne Roy, Executive Director

P.S. Today, you can double your impact for wild horses like Galahad and Snow White! Your year-end donation will be matched…so please give as generously as you can. Thank you! 

Photo: Kimerlee Curyl

AWHP UPDATE: Four Days Left to Help These Foals!

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logo_2The following is a call for support from the American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign.

 

 

Dear Meredith,

These innocent baby mustangs were at their mothers’ sides living wild and free in Nevada just days before these photos were taken. Now they cling together in the BLM’s holding pens near Reno after being captured in the BLM’s Owyheee roundup last month. Like shadows, or partners in a haunting dance, they stay side by side as they circle the feedlot pen, afraid and alone.

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We call these youngsters Opal and Sapphire. The BLM robbed them of their freedom and their families. Now agency policy threatens their very lives.

The fate of Opal and Sapphire and 45,000 other wild horses and burros stockpiled in holding facilities literally hangs in the balance. Pressure is mounting to lift the ban on killing these horses and selling them for slaughter. The new Congress and Administration will determine whether they live or die.

We face the fight of our lives in 2017 to stop the slaughter of innocent wild horses like Opal and Sapphire. Please fight with us by making an end-of-year donation today. 

Opal and Sapphire are a reason to give. Their future depends on you.

In Freedom,

Suzanne Roy, Executive Director

P.S. Remember… all end of year donations made by midnight on December 31st will be matched, so please double your impact today!  Thank you!!

AWHP Update: We Did This Together in 2016!

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The following is a special end of the year update from the American Wild Horse Preservation.

 

Hi Meredith,

I wanted to share our end-of-year video so you can see what we’ve achieved in 2017. I hope you’ll take just a moment to watch it during this busy holiday week. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MPOKlqN152Q

We’re proud of what we’ve accomplished in this year, thanks to all of our dedicated supporters who have stood with us in this fight. Thank you for all your calls, emails and petition signatures. They truly made a difference for wild horses and burros!

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In 2017, our wild horses and burros face grave threats to their future.

The political support, important legal precedents and strong grassroots base we’ve established this year provide a strong foundation for the fight ahead. 

It’s a fight we can’t afford to lose. It’s a fight I know we can win, if we continue to work together.

Will you join us now in this battle for the future of these national icons? 

Your year-end donation, no matter how large or small, is vital to our work in 2017.

All donations made during these final days of December will be matched up to $50,000!

I wish you all the best for a joyous holiday and peaceful New Year. May we continue to be inspired by the beauty and grace of the animals we are fighting so hard to save!

In Freedom,

Suzanne Roy, Executive Director

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AWHP UPDATE: Trump Nominates Interior Secretary, Future of Wild Horses on the Line!

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The following is a call to action from the American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign.

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We are at a tipping point in the fight for the future of America’s wild horses and burros. The incoming Trump Administration will either support Americans’ desire to protect these national icons or send them down the slaughter pipeline. If confirmed, Trump’s nominee for Interior Secretary, U.S. Rep. Ryan Zinke (R-MT) will play a key role in determining the fate of America’s mustangs. Unfortunately, as a State Senator from Montana, Rep. Zinke sponsored legislation to facilitate the opening of horse slaughter plants in his state, stating, “When a horse is too old to breed, too old to ride, or too expensive to feed, a horse is disposed of.”  This is obviously troubling and out of step with the 80 percent of Americans who oppose horse slaughter. More encouraging is Rep. Zinke’s opposition to selling off our public lands, a position that has often been at odds with members of his own party.

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Ultimately, if confirmed, Rep. Zinke will carry forth the policies of the incoming Trump Administration, which has promised to return government to the people. Right now, it’s critically important to send a strong message to President Elect Trump urging him to listen to the overwhelming majority of Americans who want our wild horses and burros protected and humanely managed on our Western public lands! Please take action and share, share, share this news!

 

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1,430 Wild Horse Lose Freedom in Owyhee Roundup

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The following is an update from the American Wild Horse Preservation.

November and December have proven to be rough months for the wild horses living in the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Owyhee Complex in central Nevada. The BLM office in Washington D.C. even authorized the round up of 220 more horses than originally planned in this largest BLM roundup in two years. In total, 1,832 wild horses (704 studs, 773 mares, 355 foals) were captured within the Complex, and 1,430 of these beautiful mustangs were permanently removed from their homes on the range. At least 17 horses died in the roundup, and 402 were returned to the range. 

The unreleased horses — more than 1,400 of them — were loaded onto semi trailers and trucked away from their high desert homeland to BLM’s holding pens near Reno, NV. These horses will never be free again. They — along with the nearly 46,000 other wild horses and burros warehoused in BLM holding facilites — face an uncertain fate.

AWHPC staff and prominent wild horse photographer Kimerlee Curyl were onsite at the round up last week. Check out our pictures, video and report on the roundup by clicking below.

Horses Need Homes or Face Slaughter Auction

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The following is from WHMentors.org. This adoption is a joint effort of the American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign, the Hidden Valley Wild Horse Protection Fund, Least Resistance Training Concepts and the Virginia Range Sanctuary.

sdoptThe Virginia Range horse herd, managed by the Nevada Department of Agriculture, is believed to be the largest publicly owned horse herd currently remaining in the US. The horses are managed through the cooperative efforts of the department and various qualified non-profit horse groups. While the emphasis of this management is passive population control (fertility control,) horses do occasionally spread out into the outskirts of urban areas and onto busy highways. Those that present a clear and continuing danger to motorists, and that return to busy areas after relocation attempts, do have to be removed.

State law requires the Department to dispose of any horses that are not placed with in a proscribed time at the livestock sale. Therefore every effort is being made by all parties to get these horses placed.

AWHP: We Did It!

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The following is a special thanks from the American Wild Horse Preservation.

Photo: Kimerlee Curyl Photography

We Doubled Our Giving Tuesday Goal…Thanks to You!

Dear Meredith:

WE DID IT! Thanks to you, we doubled our Giving Tuesday goal, raising $30,000 to Keep Wild Horses Wild and Free! This means that we secured the matching grant, so you doubled your money to support our work! 

On behalf of the AWHPC Team, thank you for sharing the holiday spirit and making our Giving Tuesday campaign a huge success… We are honored that you are part of our herd! 

In Freedom, 

Suzanne Roy, Executive Director

AWHP UPDATE: Owyhee Roundup Continues in Eastern Nevada!

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The following is an update from the American Wild Horse Preservation.

Since November 2nd, the Bureau of Land Management has been conducting a costly helicopter roundup to capture and remove 1,100 wild horses from the Owyhee Complex in eastern Nevada. So far, 737 wild horses have been captured and, of those, 7 have died. The BLM has returned 193 horses to the range after treating mares with the PZP birth control vaccine. Hundreds of captured Owyhee horses have been shipped to the BLM’s Palomino Valley holding facility, where they languish in feedlot pens awaiting an uncertain fate.

AWHPC is currently pressuring the BLM to provide public observation during each day of the roundup. Currently the agency plans to restrict access to the final portion of the capture operation to just two days per week.

Ask Trump: Protect Our Mustangs

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dtThe following is an update from the American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign.

Just last week, to the nation’s surprise, Donald Trump won the presidential election with a promise to cut through political bureaucracy and give government back to the people. Now let’s ask President-Elect Trump to listen to the will of the American public, which overwhelmingly opposes horse slaughter and wants our wild horses and burros protected on our public lands.

Mr. Trump is asking for the citizens’ ideas on how to make America great again. Just click the link below to tell him. The stakes could not be higher — tens of thousands of wild horses are at risk of brutal slaughter — so please act today!

 

Craft your own message, or cut and paste this one: “Please save our American mustangs – living symbols of America’s greatness. It’s time to fix federal government mismanagement of wild horses and burros. These national icons deserve to be protected and humanely managed, not rounded up and brutally slaughtered.”

AWHP: Urge BLM to Drop Wyoming Wild Mare Radio Collar Study!

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The following is an update and call to action from the American Wild Horse Preservation.

Your comments are needed today to stop the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) from conducting an expensive and traumatic helicopter roundup of wild horses in the Adobe Town Herd Management Area (HMA) for the sole purpose of putting radio collars on 30 mares. The study is designed to lay the groundwork for zeroing out the HMA by showing that Adobe Town wild horses migrate into the Checkerboard sections of the HMA following removal of horses from that area. The entire premise of the study is now invalid, because the BLM has cancelled the 2016 Checkerboard roundup in response to our recet legal victory at the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals.

Tell BLM NO to wasting our tax dollars on another unnecessary and traumatic wild horse helicopter roundup and study by clicking here.

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Your comments are needed today to tell the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to drop plans to conduct an unnecessary and dangerous radio collar tracking study of wild mares in Wyoming.

The agency wants to conduct an expensive and traumatic helicopter roundup for the sole purpose of placing radio tracking collars on 30 mares living in the Adobe Town Herd Management Area (HMA). The collars are part of a proposed 5-year study conducted in conjunction with the University of Wyoming to study the movement and habitat selection of the horses.

It is clear from the documents that the study is intended to lay the groundwork for the “zeroing out” of the Adobe Town wild horses, because it aims to prove that wild horses from the non-checkerboard portions of the HMA migrate into the checkerboard sections. The BLM is in the process of eliminating wild horses from the Wyoming Checkerboard to appease the Rock Springs Grazing Association, and wants to prove that wild horses must be eradicated from the entire area in order to keep the checkerboard clear of wild horses.

Ironically, the whole premise for the study is now void since the BLM has cancelled the 2016 Checkerboard roundup, thanks to our legal victory at the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals. Not only is this study unnecessary, but also it presents a danger to wild horses, both from the helicopter roundup that will injure and kill horses and shatter their families, and from the radio collars that are not breakaway, but rather must be released via “remote detonation” if a horse get in trouble.

Finally, the underlying bias of the study is revealed by the University of Wyoming’s research proposal, which “predicts” that the study will show  that horses can’t be kept off checkerboard lands, “disproportionately” use riparian resources, “displace” ungulate species and complicate management of other wildlife species and livestock.

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Photo courtesy of Pam Nickoles Photography

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#StopThemSally Campaign Causing Uproar On Social Media

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Following is a press release from the American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign. 

Belmont, CA – August 25, 2016 – A massive public uprising is underway on social media over cruel wild horse sterilization experiments proposed by the federal government. Using the hashtag #StopThemSally, thousands of citizens have joined the American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign (AWHPC) in calling on U.S. Interior Secretary Sally Jewell, to stop the experiments and implement sweeping reform of the federal Wild Horse and Burro Program, which is administered by the Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM).

Meanwhile, the BLM this week notified AWHPC and the Cloud Foundation that it was delaying the start date for the experiments from October 1 to November 16. The delay comes amidst public outcry and a barrage of legal actions, including a lawsuit/Motion for a Preliminary Injunction filed by AWHPC and the Cloud Foundation.

Launched on Tuesday, August 23, the #StopThemSally campaign to date has resulted in:

·         5,600 faxes sent to Department of the Interior Secretary, Sally Jewell.

·         33,000 views of an eyewitness video documenting the invasive nature of the controversial experiments to be conducted by the BLM in conjunction with Oregon State University (OSU) on 200 wild mares at the Wild Horse Corral Facility in Hines, Oregon this fall.

·         Thousands of messages left on the Facebook Page of the Department of the Interior in response to the BLM’s management of the Wild Horse and Burro Program.

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In an open letter to Secretary Jewell, the AWHPC challenged Jewell to watch the eyewitness video of the surgical sterilization procedure, called an “ovariectomy-by-colpotomy”, which will be duplicated on the mares this fall in eastern Oregon.  The procedures have been called ‘archaic’ and ‘barbaric’ by equine groups and are specifically recommended against by the National Academy of Sciences who advise that it is “inadvisable for field application.”  The surgical sterilizations involve a veterinarian blindly cutting into a mare’s vaginal wall, placing his hand and arm through the vagina into the abdominal cavity, manually locating the ovaries, then severing them with a rod-like chain tool called an ecraseur.

Messages continue to flood the Department of the Interior’s Facebook Page as public displeasure mounts in response to the BLM’s planned experimentation on wild mares in Oregon.

·         “Secretary Jewell, please cancel BLM’s plans to conduct cruel and unnecessary sterilization experiments on federally protected wild horses. Please watch the video that documents this cruelty and stop these archaic experiments now! http://wildhor.se/StopThemSally # StopThemSally.”

·         “Secretary Jewell, veterinarians call BLM’s wild horse surgical sterilization experiments “barbaric” and “inhumane.” The National Academy of Sciences recommended against surgically removing the ovaries of mares. Even the U.S. Cattlemen’s Association calls it inhumane! These are wild animals… this is not the same as spaying domestic dogs and cats. Watch the video and stop these archaic experiments now!”

·         “No sterilization of/or experiments on wild mares (even pregnant ones). We are not in Nazi Germany.”

Suzanne Roy, Executive Director of the AWHPC, relays:

“The #StopThemSally campaign is blowing up social media channels and the Department of the Interior fax line.  We’re pleased that the BLM has delayed the controversial experiments amidst this public furor and barrage of lawsuits. Now is the time to cancel these inhumane and unnecessary experiments permanently and focus on humane management strategies that keep wild horses wild and free.”

AWHPC supports the use of PZP fertility control to reduce wild horse population growth rates when necessary because it does not endanger the health or impact the natural behaviors of wild horses.

The American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign is a national wild horse advocacy organization whose grassroots mission is endorsed by a coalition of more than 60 horse advocacy, public interest, and conservation organizations. AWHPC is dedicated to preserving the American wild horse in viable, free-roaming herds for generations to come, as part of our national heritage.

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