The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) announced its current summer schedule for gathering wild horses and burros roaming Western public rangelands on July 19. The schedule is subject to change because of continuing drought conditions that are resulting in significantly limited water and forage for wildlife, wild horses and burros, and livestock. BLM managers are monitoring animal and range conditions, reducing livestock grazing, enacting fire restrictions, and providing supplemental water in some locations for wild horses.

Most of the gathers on the schedule will use bait and water trapping to attract, gather, and remove animals to off-range pastures and corrals over the next several months. The BLM says they successfully used the bait trapping method to remove 38 wild horses during the 2012 Pryor Mountain (Montana) wild horse gather. Because of access constraints, lack of suitable bait-water trapping sites, and the need for more immediate action related to animal condition, six of the proposed gathers will be conducted using helicopters.

Most of the upcoming gathers have been scheduled in response to emergency conditions brought on by drought; public safety issues related to animals that roam near highways, residential areas, and agricultural areas; and requests from private landowners who have asked the BLM to remove from their property wild horses and burros that have strayed beyond herd management area (HMA) boundaries.

With the exception of some retreatments of mares in the Little Bookcliffs (Colorado) Wild Horse Range, the agency does not intend to administer fertility-control vaccine during any of the proposed summer gathers. Instead, the BLM intends to implement fertility-control treatments through ground-darting operations and during gathers between November and February—before breeding season—when the vaccines’ maximum effectiveness can be realized