Wild horses photographed on the Onaqui Herd Management Area in Utah earlier this year.
The Bureau of Land Management has updated its wild horse and burro roundup calendar.
The agency has plans to capture a total of 6,743 wild horses and burros, removing 6,543, for Fiscal Year 2019, which ends on Sept. 30. It has tentatively set two roundups totaling 400 removals in October to start Fiscal Year 2020.
BLM has captured and removed 2,637 wild horses and burros in Fiscal Year 2019, so far. The agency has signaled plans to remove far greater numbers of horses and burros in Fiscal Year 2020.
Of the roundups left on the calendar, it plans to use helicopters for five of them: Triple B Complex in Nevada (800 horses), Pine Nut Mountains Herd Management Area in Nevada (250), Fish Creek HMA in Nevada (500), Range Creek HMA in Utah (200), and Onaqui HMA in Utah (200).
The balance of the roundups will use bait trapping using feed or water, including three ongoing burro roundups in Arizona and Nevada.
The BLM has reduced the number of wild horses for the controversial Onaqui roundup. It had planned to remove 465 out of an estimated 586 wild horses.
Under pressure from advocates, including RTF and its supporters, the agency has lowered the number to 200 wild horses that it says are on private land outside the borders of the Onaqui HMA, while working with volunteers to dart mares with fertility control within the HMA’s boundaries.
During this fiscal year, BLM has treated and released just 129 mares and jennies with safe, proven and humane fertility control during roundups.