Halt To Wild Horse, Burro Roundups Sought By Escondido Lawmaker

ESCONDIDO, CA — In commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the federal Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971, an Escondido lawmaker wants to see a moratorium on all further roundups of wild equids in California.

Assemblymember Marie Waldron (R), whose 75th District includes Temecula and a swath across North County San Diego, joined Assemblymember Luz Rivas (D-Arleta) to author Assembly Joint Resolution 5, which urges the federal government to halt roundups of California's free-roaming horses and burros.

According to the California office of the Bureau of Land Management, the federal agency manages 21 wild horse and burro herd areas on approximately 2.5 million acres in the state. The "combined appropriate management level" is 2,200 animals statewide, according to the BLM.

Additionally, the U.S. Forest Service manages wild horses and burros in some California areas. Locally, wild-roaming burros can be spotted near the San Gorgonio Pass Area and in Big Bear, but the number of free-roaming wild horses and burros on public lands has decreased.

Waldron wants to see the BLM and the USFS restore California's herds "to their legal areas throughout the state."

"Overpopulation concerns have led to frequent roundups, often conducted with helicopters that stampede the animals into enclosures," she wrote in a self-penned article on Patch. "This practice is controversial since it can lead to injury or death for panicked animals."

According to the Assembly Joint Resolution 5, "after four decades under the management of the United States Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the United States Forest Service (USFS), our nation’s wild horses and burros now find themselves at alarmingly low population numbers," with disrupted social structures, and being cheated and removed from their rightful legal areas and forage allocations on BLM and USFS lands.

Waldron wants to see more humane management techniques, including "reserve design," which incorporates buffer zones, and natural and artificial barriers for the animals. She is also calling on adoption and other options "to establish long-term viable populations in sustainable habitats."

"Present plans of the BLM and USFS only continue to excessively reduce the wild horse and burro herds to illegally low, genetically nonviable levels," according to AJR 5.

The resolution argues that the federal agencies are allowing "other interests, particularly livestock," to consume greater quantities of forage and water. As such, the BLM and USFS are not upholding their responsibility to protect the herds under the federal Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971.

Waldron's efforts coincide with a national movement criticizing the federal government for its herd management practices.

In an April 9 letter to newly confirmed U.S. Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland, a coalition of more than 70 equine protection, animal welfare and environmental groups, as well as numerous wild-horse and ecotourism businesses, said livestock grazing is “severely biased against horse populations and other protected and native species on horse-occupied Bureau of Land Management HMAs.”

Among other things, the letter calls on Haaland to immediately end all cattle/sheep grazing on all horse-occupied BLM Herd Management Area lands and it requests that wild horse/burro population sizes be retained.