A group of wild horses are rounded up in Eureka, Nevada. (Getty Images file photo)

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Another 36 wild horses, including eight foals, were captured on Friday during the ongoing helicopter roundup at the Owyhee Complex in Northern Nevada, according to the Bureau of Land Management.

The others trapped included 13 stallions and 15 mares, bringing the three-day total to 163. Two horses have died.

Also on Friday, 26 studs and 13 mares were transported to the Palomino Valley Wild Horse and Burro Adoption Center near Reno, Nevada, where they will be prepared for the BLM adoption program. Those not adopted will later be transported to off-range pastures.

The BLM plans to capture 680 wild horses in and around the Elko District’s Rock Creek and Owyhee Horse Management Areas. Of those, about 450 will be removed from the range.

A second phase of the roundup is scheduled to be held after Thanksgiving on the Winnemucca District’s Little Owyhee Horse Management Area. There, 920 wild horses are the be captured and 650 removed from the range.

Mares that are not transported will be treated with PZP-22 fertility control vaccine before release.

BLM justifies the roundup as an effort to “remove excess wild horses in order to prevent further deterioration of Greater Sage grouse habitat within the Sagebrush Focal Area (in northern Elko and Humboldt Counties. Overpopulation of wild horses leads to the degradation of rangeland resources, which adversely impacts habitat for other species as well as the horses themselves.”