Are They REALLY Free-Roaming?

Over the last nearly decade I have done a great deal of research on the issue of wild horses and burros. Over the years I have become more and more irritated about what is happening with these majestic animals. But one thing I never was concerned about was that those on the range were at least wild and free. After reviewing a number of EAs and other BLM documents in the last year something has struck me. I have to ask the question are the horses and burros really wild and free or am I just fooling myself?

Before anyone goes off on me hear me out please.

How can they be free roaming when if they step a hoof over a certain invisible line they aren't free but suddenly considered estray and eligible for immediate gathering. In some states, especially Nevada, the state will even gather them when they ROAM to find food and/or water.  They aren't free roaming when their traditional ranges are fenced and cross-fenced. They are fenced off from their traditional water sources that they have used for hundreds of years.  Their free roaming abilities stopped short by various land usage.  They aren't free when their land is "transferred" to other agencies and they are removed to accomplish the other agency's objectives.  They aren't free when the land that was promised under the law is taken from them by the very agency and Secretary that is assigned to protect them.  They aren't free if they are kept from their family bands and forced into sterilization programs at the worst and into birth control programs at the least. When their families are shattered by the sounds of incoming helicopters and they face losing their young, their future, their traditions, their history and their knowledge through the loss of their elders.

No they are not human, they are better than that. These animals live in a complex social society where families recognize each other and where they care for their young long after they are weaned and the older animals stay with the family even when they are no longer breeding. And that society is destroyed each time a gather is done. It certainly suffers when they have to grieve the loss of members of their bands. Foals are ripped from their mothers, fathers and siblings long before they would leave if they were left alone. The older horses who teach the younger animals where to find water when there is a drought or where to find the tastiest grasses or where to go to survive a snowstorm are being removed leaving the herds in danger of suffering and death. Instead of enjoying them or studying them to fully understand their social structure our government wants to destroy them. They want to put them in "sanctuaries", which are nothing more than a glorified zoo. They want to destroy them, put them in abusive or improper homes at best or at worst send them to slaughter. They want to do something that we horse folks stop long ago, break them.

Then I think about how much these wild mustangs and burros mean to so many people. How they symbolize the freedom and majesty of this country. How they represent our country's very history. When people are asked what animal they would most like to be many say a mustang or an eagle because of the freedom, so like our own. This then leaves me asking what next? 

Elected officials don't listen when the average person asks for their help. Before and during the gather in the Pryor Mountains (Cloud's herd) the public made thousands of calls asking for Congress and the President to stop the gather.  Instead of an immediate response, there was a decided silence from those elected officials.  The BLM certainly doesn't listen. Over the years millions of comments have been made on behalf of the horses and burros.  There have been thousands of law suits filed on behalf of those who care about the horses, yet the BLM push through their agenda regardless.  The law of the land is ignored and those guilty of mistreating these animals or other illegal actions(Catoor convicted of gathering them illegally, BLM employees shooting horses, BLM employees selling wild horses to slaughter, BLM telling lies in reports, BLM employees changing scientific data to suit their own agenda, BLM employees conspiring with contractors and special interest and so much more)aren't punished but instead continue to draw a check from OUR tax dollars with impunity.  Advocates can't stop it because we don't have enough money to go to court and fight for years before we get a hollow victory. Even if we could go to court we are limited in what we can fight for and those limits allow the BLM to go on and on with their devious plans. People who care and do file court documents are forced to prove that they not only have visited the horses but that they would be personally injured by their loss, not just that knowing they are gone and that these are OUR horses we are injured. Not that the loss of these animals cause children to cry and ask why and we are forced to answer we don't know.

This is supposed to be a country of laws. However, it appears that some can ignore those laws. There is a LAW protecting these animals. There is a LAW that says that they are to be managed as minimally as possible. There is a LAW that says that they are supposed to be considered an integral part of the ecosystem. There is a LAW that only EXCESS horses are to be removed. Yet these laws are being broken every day at the BLM. We have court decisions that say that zeroing out horses is illegal as not EVERY horse can be considered excess, yet the BLM continues to do this. Nobody is being punished and nobody will be. Back in the 1990's several BLM employees were found to have been taking horses and selling them, some directly to slaughter. Instead of prosecuting them it was determined that it would be an adverse action to punish a few when so many within the agency are doing the same thing. They didn't even lose their jobs!!  Some like Suzie Stokke have even been promoted.

As the BLM continues to gather horses and burros at an accelerated pace, with more gathers beginning soon one has to ask are these horses and burros inappropriately named?  What does it really mean to be wild and free-roaming?