God created this earth for us to take care of. He created animals for us to enjoy and to take care of. We must be good stewards of His earth that He has given and entrusted to us to take care of.

One of the biggest issues going on right now in the United States is between those that are trying to save our wild mustangs and the cattle ranchers who use the public lands for grazing of their cattle.

At one time we had over 2 million and that is million wild horses roaming free in most of the western states to the pacific coast. Now we have around 33,000 left with half of them being held in pens, either to spend the rest of their lives their or be sent for slaughter to either Canada or Mexico.

One of the most beautiful wild mustangs in California, called the Cloud herd. This August 30th if the Bureau of Land Management has their way they will with their helicopters and AV's cut half this herd up and send them to pens in Nevada.

They will geld the stallions and try to get them adopted out or if need be send them to slaughter.

None of this is necessary because the horses are health and have been watched by the Cloud Foundation for 15 years with not problem for the horses or the ecosystem.

What is the problem is that cattle ranchers are looking for more land to destroy with their cattle and the BLM is allowing them to do so.

They call them feral horses, not native to America, but these horses at one time once came from the America and by man's own hand had brought them back to where they belong since the 1500's.

There are beautiful Spanish blood lines that are going to be forever lost as well as this beautiful herd unless we do something to stop it. It is estimated that if we do not do something now to protect our wild horses they will be all gone by 2020 from public lands.

Please join by contacting by phone 719.633.3842 or check out their website at: http://www.thecloudfoundation.org/cloudcollection.html for more information.

Just saw an 80s rerun favourite of mine - yes, I admit to being an A-Team fan (saves a lot of money for important issues in generating publicity!) - based in the US south depicting Red Indians trying to prevent a rancher stealing the wild mustangs. It took extraordinary measures back then, it appeared, to get law enforcement to stop it - was it a disinteresting crime back then?!

Has the FBI no interest in it today at all, or is it more a political, beaurocratic rangle, in the end - between the FBI and BLM or whomever?

This is what the BLM has to say about the wild horses.

the link to the BLM National Wild Horse and Burro Progaram.
and the Extreme Mustang Make Over

So they argue for crowd management...: is the Cloud herd, photographed in that Cloud Founation website, in need of management...?! Maybe not.

I'm a supporter of traditional fox hunting with dogs, in Great Britain - a matter of professional dogs executing instant kills: foxes are pests causing damage to private property, especially agricultural, nation wide and so their numbers need curtailing. This is been banned by obnoxious members of the House of Commons.

How well does the US BLM control numbers...?

The issue has been between cattle ranchers and wild horses since the 1800's. At one time there were 2 million wild mustangs across the western states of America. As mankind headed west and land was taken the cattle ranchers kept digging into the wild areas where the wild horses were. They killed the horses to make room for their ranches as well as sheep herders, farms, etc., the land for the wild horses became less and less as well as the number of horses.

Theodore Roosevelt was the first President to start setting lands apart for the safety of the beautiful parks and BLM land that we have today. But the cattle ranchers would not be put off, they worked with the BLM to rent out public lands to graze their cattle and thus the issue of the wild horses continues and the number being killed continues.

The 1971 act was to set land aside for the wild horses, but this has been taken inch by inch in the last twenty years or so by the BLM from the horses and given to the ranchers.

When the grazing has destroyed the wildlife forage, they go back to the BLM to give them new land to graze for their cattle and thus the horses are rounded up and sold to people or to slaughter.

We now have between those in pens and out in the wild only 33,000 wild mustangs. This year they are planning to round up another two thousand in four states. It never ends. That is why there is a bill named HR 1018 To amend the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act and protect the wild horses that should have been protected by the original Act written back in 1971.

If something is not done soon there will be no more wild mustangs roaming the public lands by 2015. They either will be domesticated horses owned by people or slaughtered horses for food for Europe to have eaten, but they will be all gone.

The Bureau of Land Management is suppose to be there to protect the horses and all other wildlife from the encroachment of man. They are suppose to protect the animals that God gave to us to be stewards of, not to kill for pleasure or food. God had set aside which animals we were to eat and we as Seventh-day Adventist know this better than any other Christian denomination.

If we would leave nature to balance itself with predator and prey they would do what comes natural to the very balance of nature in this world.

Colin:

When there are humane ways to take care of animals that have become pests we should do so.

Hunting is a sport to kill an animal. Causing the suffering of the animal as it fleas for its life is not humane. As the dogs circle and attack it tearing it apart for the sport is not humane. This is an animal that had been kept in captivity to be released for the hunt and kill.

England did the right thing by ending this horrid sport and so should other countries. We are suppose to be a humane society today, not the barbaric ignorant people of the past.

Glad they had the courage to end it.

Thank you for the fuller story of the Mustangs! Yes, bad beaurocracy equals bad stewardship!!

Fox hunting a sport???!! Not in the UK! - ever!! Would you like to know the facts?

The British media and politicians are the primary culprits in misrepresenting one of the oldest, continuing, lawful industries in Britain! Have you obtained info also from the organised fox hunts or just from their opponents?

Hunting with hounds is scientifically the most humane method of culling their preyless numbers and reducing the damage they wreak. It's agreed by all concerned in the protection of private property from scavengers. The preference of both sides affected by foxes - landowners and the hunt masters, and has been a practice of stewardship for centuries: hounds kill foxes instantly, by breaking the neck - even better than wildlife on Africa's plains where killing is by strangulation. Any shaking of the fox carcass is shaking of a carcass, and is done so younger hounds can learn the scent of the foxes.

These hounds are pedigree dogs established by decades and even centuries of breeding, and are retired while some are sold as pets, without being trained to hunt fox scent, as pedigrees of their breed. Stopping hunting with hounds is damaging that angle, another commercial aspect of fox hounds, too.

Foxes are wild and not kept captive - don't know where you heard of that?! Rather, the damage they inflict on private farm land and to farm animals brings the hounds and hunt masters out to deal with the foxes on a daily basis: the hounds hunt full time, not just on weekends. The farmers pay the kennels for the service of protecting their private land.

Guns are involved, but not nearly as reliable as hounds for instantly killing foxes stone dead on sight, should the fox even be caught by the hounds, since shooting may easily leave foxes injuried but not dead, as foxes are not statues! This shooting barbarity is what the House of Commons has foisted on our wildlife! Yes, an unconstitutional procedure of the Commons overriding the equally sovereign House of Lords - by the Parliament Acts 1912 & 1949 (I think) - after 4 rounds of amendments from the Lords is the story of the Hunting Act here, and another sign of the values of the UK disintegrating.

The weekend hunts with the local community gathered in support of their local organised hunt masters and members of the supporters' club - each hunt looks after a smallish part of the county it's in, isn't a sport of hunting!! Some of the horse riders have to rent their horse for the day, and all are not able to jump fences! Only the core huntsmen and women, including vets, so all the professionals, always do that - the vets tend to the hounds and certify that the foxes caught and killed are humanely, instantly killed. It is down to these rides that the race horse community keeps its horses fit between racing seasons. Race horses need this exercise, of course.

It's the pleasure of having permission from landowners to ride over private land that is the sport involved here!

Hunting with hounds is Christian stewardship, designed in a Christian nation over many generations of farmers and hunt masters. Foxes can't be domesticated, so this is the way those affected by foxes want to deal with them.

Part of Christian stewardship of nature is the fundamental principle that human rights are not transferrable to animals. Thus the whole argument against hunting with hounds is mistaken on the Biblical principle, aside from the science on humane hunting with hounds being totally ignored by opponents over here. That's why it's part of British culture, and shouldn't be interferred with.

National Geographic, Feb. 2009 issue has an article on the wild mustangs.

There is another article from NG 2001.

Cheers, reading it just now

Just finished it, now, and the Cloud herd is mentioned, too - that's publicity for you!

Yes, the only comforting factor of the system is the BLM keeping 30000 on the range since that's how many are in captivity. It's a really difficult mix - even Ranchers can meddle in herd structures, but it's much more natural than the gathering each year! There's a chance for stronger mustangs to escape capture, with the ranchers...Of course horses can be depressed!

Faith does help to accept the mustang as being a genuine part of the wild.