A contractor’s helicopter drives wild horses toward the trap site at the Red Desert Complex on Oct. 11, 2020. Photo: Meg Frederick.
The Bureau of Land Management will start capturing 1,035 wild horses from the Stewart Creek and Green Mountain Herd Management Areas in south-central Wyoming as soon as Thursday.
The helicopter roundup is part of a longer-term plan to remove about 1,800 horses from the Red Desert Complex of Herd Management Areas to “address significant wild horse overpopulation and protect rangeland health,” in the BLM’s words.
The 752,694-acre complex has a BLM-estimated wild horse population of 2,278. The agency has set a complex-wide population target, or “Appropriate Management Level,” of 480-720.
Six years ago, the BLM removed 1,970 wild horses from the complex out of what it estimated to be “approximately 3,000 horses.” Ten were killed.
The agency returned 197 horses to the range, including just 100 mares treated with proven, safe, and humane fertility control in order to slow population growth.
Return to Freedom has long supported the use of fertility control as a key tool for reducing roundups on the way to replacing them as the agency’s primary management method.
This time, the BLM plans to treat just 52 mares with fertility control, returning them to the range with the same number of stallions.
Privately-owned cattle and sheep also graze seasonally in the Red Desert. On allotments overlapping the complex, BLM has allocated enough forage for the year-round equivalent of 4,842 cow-calf pairs. Actual use has been significantly reduced in recent years.
Our sanctuary rescued 19 Red Desert wild horses after the 2020 roundup there.