What You Need to Know About Wild Horse Round Ups

We’ve been struggling to put into words our thoughts around the most recent helicopter round up of Sand Wash Basin’s wild mustangs. We knew processing these thoughts in a post would be extensive so turned to our blog instead. 

There are a lot of opinions regarding wild horses and common perceptions and themes that come to the forefront of every round up, so we want to address those here in this post. 



But first, let’s go through a brief history on the topic of wild horse protection. We’ll add in lots of pictures to keep you interested!

The federal protection of America’s wild horses began with public concern over what was happening to horses on the Western range. 

• The 1950s: Velma Bronn Johnston, known as “Wild Horse Annie”, began campaigning for wild horses after witnessing their brutal treatment after being captured for commercial purposes. Advocacy often starts small and this was no different. Velma was driving to work near Reno, Nevada, when she noticed blood coming from a livestock truck and trailer ahead of her. She began a movement to bring awareness of their plight to the public.

• 1959: Congress passed the Wild Horse Protection Act, commonly called, “The Wild Horse Annie Act”. It prohibited the use of motor vehicles or aircraft to hunt wild horses and burros on public lands and prohibited the use of poison at water holes to kill or capture them. 

• 1971: By 1971, wild horse population on public lands had declined significantly. Following continued public pressure, Congress passed the Wild Free Roaming Horses and Burros Act, signed into law in December of 1971. The law declared horses and burros, “living symbols of the historic and pioneer spirit of the West” and required they be protected from capture, branding, harassment, and death. Important to note here, Congress directed that they be considered, “an integral part of the natural system of public lands”. This is very important, don’t lose sight of that line. We will come back to it. 

• Late 1970s: Congress subsequently amended the law. The Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976 authorized the use of helicopters and motorized vehicles in wild horse management. The Public Rangelands Improvement Act of 1978 further established the framework for identifying and removing animals determined to be “excess” while continuing federal policy of protecting wild free roaming horses and burros. 

• Today: The result of this is the system we know today: the Bureau of Land Management and the U.S. Forest Service are charged with protecting and managing wild horses and burros on designated federal public lands.

The program has changed substantially since 1971 but its foundation has always been a law born from one woman, who cared enough to advocate for living animals who had no voice.

What is the Bureau of Land Management? 

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is a federal agency within the U.S. Department of the Interior. It was created in 1946 when the General Land Office and the U.S. Grazing Service were combined. Today, the BLM is the largest land manager, responsible for approximately 245 million acres of public land, as well as roughly 700 million acres of federal mineral estate land. 

The BLM operates through several layers: U.S. Department of the Interior>State Offices>District Offices>Field Offices. 

The structure of this is important. Although the Wild Horse and Burro Program is a federal program, many management decisions are implemented through the state, district, and field office structure responsible for that herd and land. 

In Colorado, the Colorado State Office oversees more than 8.3 million acres of public land. It’s divided into district and field offices that manage particular areas of the state. 



So when we say the BLM, we are not talking about a single office or a group of people in Washington D.C. making every decision. We are talking about a federal land management agency with national leadership and policy, state level oversight with district and field offices responsible for implementing that management on the ground. 

The BLM manages the wild horse and burro population using an Appropriate Management Level, or AML, number.

AML is the population range BLM establishes for wild horses and burros within each Herd Management Area (HMA), while maintaining a “thriving natural ecological balance”. AML is normally expressed as a range rather than a number, meaning there is a low AML and a high AML. 

The BLM’s position is that some population limit is necessary. Wild horse populations can grow rapidly, while forage and water are finite and vary with drought, wildfire and other environmental conditions. BLM argues that allowing populations to grow unchecked can eventually damage vegetation and water resources, resulting in horses suffering from inadequate food and water. The BLM states that AMLs aren’t simply arbitrary horse counts. They are developed through land use planning and analysis of information, including vegetation, soils, water, weather, and population data. 



At a glance, this sounds reasonable. But AML is also the benchmark BLM uses to determine when wild horses are considered "excess" and subject to removal under federal law. That makes how AML is established and reevaluated extremely important.

For a wild horse, AML is the difference between a life of freedom or forcible removal from the range, only to end up standing for months, if not years, in a cramped holding pen.

BLM and some members of the public like to point to AML as a scientifically backed number.

So how scientific is it?

One of the strongest critiques came from the National Research Council of the National Academies, which BLM itself asked to review the Wild Horse and Burro Program.

In 2013, the National Academies identified significant weaknesses in the AML process. It found that BLM guidance lacked sufficient specificity for establishing and adjusting AMLs and provided inadequate detail about monitoring rangeland conditions. It also noted that concepts such as “thriving natural ecological balance” lacked precise definitions and found that BLM's management of free ranging horses and burros was not supported by rigorous population monitoring procedures at that time.

Historical Government Accountability Office findings raise additional questions.

The GAO found that, before 1984, many AMLs were not based on rangeland monitoring data. Some were based on existing horse populations, administrative considerations, or agreements involving grazing interests. Of 26 BLM field offices surveyed, only 10 reported using rangeland data to establish AMLs. In Wyoming, GAO reported that approximately one-third of HMA AMLs had been established through agreements with local grazing interests whose private lands were interspersed with BLM lands. In 2008, GAO again found that BLM had not provided field offices with specific formal guidance for consistently establishing AMLs. GAO recommended standardized guidance, and BLM subsequently implemented guidance addressing that recommendation in 2010.

That does not mean AMLs have never been adjusted or supported by newer information. But it raises a fair question: When was each HMA's AML last subjected to a comprehensive, data driven evaluation using current conditions?

Wild horses are not the only consideration for AML. One of the most persistent issues in federal wild horse management is the relationship between wild horses and privately owned livestock grazing on public lands.

Private ranchers do not own BLM land, but the federal government issues grazing permits and leases allowing privately owned cattle and sheep to graze millions of acres of public land. BLM currently administers nearly 18,000 grazing permits and leases across more than 21,000 grazing allotments.

That overlap matters because livestock, wild horses, and wildlife all use the same finite forage and water resources.

The National Academies found that, in some HMAs, managers described calculating available forage by first accounting for forage allocated to existing livestock grazing privileges and then determining what remained for wildlife and wild horses. The report also found considerable variation among BLM offices in how those allocations were established.

The Government Accountability Office has also documented the historical tension.

In 1989, GAO concluded that BLM had sometimes placed the interests of livestock permittees ahead of long term rangeland health and had not equitably treated wild horses when addressing overgrazing. Later GAO work in 2008 noted that wild horse removals had not always been accompanied by corresponding reductions in livestock grazing, even when overgrazing was an issue. 

BLM conducts dedicated aerial population surveys to estimate the number of wild horses on the range. We have not found evidence that BLM conducts a comparable annual aerial analysis of privately owned livestock. Livestock use is instead primarily documented through the grazing permit system and operator reported actual use. So basically, the honor system. This distinction matters because wild horse population estimates are repeatedly updated and compared against AML, while the same cannot be said for all livestock and wildlife supported by the range.



This does not establish that ranchers control BLM or that every wild horse removal is conducted to benefit livestock producers. BLM is legally required to manage public lands for multiple uses, including livestock grazing, wildlife, recreation, conservation and wild horses.

But it does make the allocation of forage an important part of this conversation. When BLM determines how many wild horses an HMA can support, those horses are not being considered alone. Livestock grazing is already authorized across portions of these same public lands and forage is allocated among competing uses. That makes it important to look beyond the number of livestock authorized to graze and ask how much grazing is actually occurring.

With forage divided among competing uses, determining how many horses a landscape can support is important.

There is another reason current, site specific information matters: emerging research complicates the assumption that horse grazing is inherently synonymous with ecological degradation. Research increasingly demonstrates that free ranging horses are not simply consumers of forage, they also influence how ecosystems function.

A 2021 peer reviewed study published in Science documented horses and burros digging wells and water holes up to six and a half feet deep to reach groundwater in arid environments. These wells increased area surface water, reduced distances between water sources, and sometimes provided the only available surface water at study sites. Researches documented 57 different vertebrate species using these wells. The researchers described the horses and burros as "ecosystem engineers". Interestingly, we have personally seen the wild horses of Sand Wash Basin using their hooves to break the ice on frozen ponds in the winter, allowing any number of Sand Wash residents, including the livestock sheep, access to water during cold months.

A 2024 peer reviewed study published in Biological Conservation compared grasslands grazed by horses managed as “wild,” domestic horses, and sheep. Sheep are particularly interesting here as Sand Wash Basin HMA hosts hundreds, if not thousands, of sheep for several months every year.

Researchers surveyed 208 vegetation plots and found that areas grazed by horses managed as wild had greater plant species richness, evenness, and vegetation heterogeneity than sheep grazed areas. The authors concluded that horse grazing can help maintain or promote grassland diversity, particularly when horses are able to express natural grazing behavior.

Sweden conducted a three year study and found horse grazing could be incorporated into ecological restoration.  A European rewilding study found that twice as many birds were located in a horse grazed area than a nearby ungrazed area. 

Let's review a study conducted closer to home.

In 2019, USGS researchers studied the Little Books Cliffs HMA, near Grand Junction, Colorado. Researchers specifically studied manure and determined horses can act as long distance seed dispersers by transporting viable seeds through their digestive system and depositing them in manure. The study showed plants germinated from 30% of the horse manure samples.

Together, these studies challenge the idea that the presence of horses, or horse grazing itself, automatically establishes ecological degradation. They demonstrate that horses can also perform ecological functions that are easily overlooked when they are viewed solely as consumers of forage.



But forage consumption is a central part of how BLM manages both wild horses and livestock. And to understand how that forage is measured and allocated, we need to understand another BLM measurement: AUM.

An Animal Unit Month (AUM) is a standardized measure of forage use for one month. BLM generally considers one animal unit to be one cow and calf, one horse, or five sheep or goats. An important distinction: authorized AUMs represent permitted grazing use, not necessarily the amount actually used.

In BLM’s 2021 Sand Wash Basin Wild Horse Gather Environmental Assessment, the agency reported 6,377 active livestock AUMs for the portion of the Sand Wash Allotment within the HMA. Yet BLM’s 2008 through 2020 data showed average actual livestock use of approximately 2,103 AUMs for 33% of the authorized amount.

Earlier BLM records provide additional context. A 1997 Ecological Site Inventory estimated 4,961 available federal AUMs in the Main Sand Wash Pasture. BLM later summarized its monitoring data as:

• 4,961 AUMs: Available based on the 1997 Ecological Site Inventory
• 509 AUMs: 10-year average livestock use
• 1,234 AUMs: 10-year average wild horse use
• 3,218 AUMs: “Annual unused AUMs still available”
• 26%: Average combined livestock, wild horse and wildlife utilization
• 64%: Vegetation trend monitoring locations showing an upward trend

The reporting periods and measurements differ, so these figures should not be treated as directly interchangeable. But together, BLM’s records show why authorized grazing, actual grazing, available forage and carrying capacity are not the same thing.

So, Where Are We Today? BLM currently manages the Sand Wash Basin wild horse population with an AML range of 163–362 horses.

In 2026, BLM estimated 505 wild horses and described the population as approximately 140% above what the agency says the range can sustainably support, leading to another helicopter round up and removal of 245 horses.

That brings us to a critical question: If 362 horses represents the maximum population Sand Wash Basin can sustainably support, what current forage and carrying capacity analysis supports that number?

BLM’s own records show thousands of livestock AUMs have been authorized on this landscape while actual livestock use has been substantially lower. We understand livestock, horses and wildlife use the landscape differently, and forage availability, drought, seasonal use and current range conditions all matter. But these factors are precisely why current data matters.

How much forage does Sand Wash Basin produce today? How much is allocated to livestock? How much is actually used? How much is consumed by wild horses and wildlife? How much is consumed by livestock? And how much remains available?

If BLM states that 505 horses exceed the sustainable capacity AML of Sand Wash Basin, when their own data shows unused, available AUMs for the previous the 23 year period, the public should be able to see the current data and methodology supporting that conclusion.

We also can't talk about AML without bringing up another heated point of debate: Wild or Feral?

This debate deserves attention because it shapes the conversation before it even begins. You've probably heard some version of it.

• They're not wildlife. They're feral livestock.
• They aren't native.
• They're basically abandoned domestic horses.

Sometimes the word invasive gets thrown in for good measure.

There is truth mixed into that rhetoric, but the history is considerably more complicated than the soundbite suggests.

Horses evolved in North America. That isn't an advocacy position, it is part of the paleontological record. The National Park Service states plainly that horses evolved here before spreading to other parts of the world. Horses disappeared from North America near the end of the Pleistocene, while populations that had migrated into Eurasia survived.

Centuries later, their descendants returned with humans.

The BLM acknowledges this history as well. On its own "Myths and Facts" page, the agency states that “caballine horses did evolve in North America.” The BLM nevertheless considers today's free roaming horses descendants of domesticated animals and notes that many biologists would therefore describe them as feral. The agency itself, however, calls them wild horses because that is what Congress defined them to be.

And that distinction matters. Congress did not pass the Feral Livestock Management Act in 1971. It passed the Wild Free Roaming Horses and Burros Act.

As stated earlier, Congress declared these animals to be “living symbols of the historic and pioneer spirit of the West” and directed that they be protected from capture, branding, harassment and death. The law further directed that wild horses and burros be considered “an integral part of the natural system of the public lands.”

So why does the word feral remain so prominent in arguments about their management? Because language shapes perception.

Call an animal wildlife, and people tend to ask how its habitat should be protected. Call the same animal feral, and suddenly the question becomes how it should be controlled. Call it non native, and removal begins to sound like restoration. Call it invasive, and eradication can begin to sound like conservation.

The language becomes even more consequential when it is paired with another word used throughout federal wild horse management: Excess. First they become feral. Then non native. Then overpopulated. Then excess. And once an animal has been rhetorically transformed from a protected wild horse into an excess, non native animal competing for resources, removing it from the landscape becomes considerably easier to sell.

That does not mean every scientist or land manager who uses the term feral has an agenda. In biology, the term has a legitimate meaning: a free ranging population descended from domesticated animals. The BLM has itself used that terminology in technical documents, including describing North America's free roaming horses as biologically feral.

But scientific terminology and public rhetoric are not always the same thing. And this particular label leaves out a remarkable part of the horse's story.

The horse did not originate in Spain. It did not originate on a European ranch. The origin of equines began here, in North America, years before there was a Bureau of Land Management, a grazing permit, a livestock allotment or even a United States.

Today's wild horses unquestionably carry the genetic fingerprints of domestication. Many also descend from animals released or escaped from ranchers, miners, the U.S. Cavalry, Native Americans and others during relatively recent history. The BLM acknowledges that history. But reducing the entire story to “they're just feral livestock” erases everything that came before it. Perhaps even more importantly, their federal protection does not depend upon winning the native vs feral debate.

The BLM itself acknowledges this. Its current guidance states that the agency is required to manage wild horses as an integral part of the natural system “regardless of their ancestry.” The BLM says the evolutionary debate does not change its obligations under the Wild Free Roaming Horses and Burros Act.

That is an important point.

We can debate whether today's mustang should scientifically be called native, reintroduced, naturalized or feral. We cannot debate whether Congress called them wild. And we cannot use the word feral to quietly erase the protections Congress gave them.

The words used to describe these horses can shape the conversation. But the people given a formal voice in their management can shape it too.

Understanding how decisions are made on public lands also means understanding who has a formal opportunity to advise the BLM. One is through the Resource Advisory Council, or RAC. 

RACs are citizen based advisory groups established under federal law to provide recommendations to the BLM on public land management. Their role has roots in federal grazing policy and the BLM established the modern RAC structure as part of its 1995 grazing regulations. Their responsibilities have since expanded. 

Today, the RAC advises BLM on issues including land use planning, recreation, energy development, livestock grazing, conservation, fire management, and wild horse and burro management.

Although the role of the RAC is advisory without authority, that does not make them insignificant. BLM describes RACs as a mechanism for bringing stakeholder perspectives directly into public land management and says their recommendations provide the agency with important feedback on current issues, concerns and proposals. 

So who gets a seat at the RAC table? 

RAC membership is deliberately structured around competing public land interests. A full RAC generally consists of 15 members divided among three stakeholder categories.

Commodity and Commercial Interests

This category specifically includes:

• Holders of federal grazing permits
• Energy and mineral development interests
• Timber interests
• Transportation and rights of way interests
• Off highway vehicle interests
• Commercial and developed recreation interests

In other words, ranchers holding federal grazing permits are specifically designated as one of the interests the RAC system is intended to represent.

Conservation and Non-Commodity Interests

This category includes:

• Environmental organizations
• Archaeological and historic organizations
• Dispersed recreation interests
• Wild horse and burro organizations

This is where wild horse advocates can receive formal representation.



Government and Community Interests

This category includes:

• State, county and local elected officials
• State natural resource agencies
• Tribal representatives
• Academics working in natural sciences or natural-resource management
• Members of the public at large

The structure is important because RACs were not designed to represent only conservation interests, ranchers or wild horse advocates. They were deliberately constructed to place people with competing interests in public lands at the same table.

RAC members are not elected by the public.

Individuals can apply or be nominated to serve. BLM evaluates nominees based on their education, training, experience, knowledge of the geographic area and ability to participate in collaborative decision making.

Members are ultimately appointed by the Secretary of the Interior, generally for three year terms. A person occupying a federal grazing seat is therefore not simply participating as an individual citizen; that seat exists specifically to provide representation for federal grazing interests. Likewise, a member appointed to a wild horse and burro seat represents that constituency.

The goal, according to BLM, is balanced representation among the competing interests that use and care about public lands.

The Northwest RAC advises BLM's Northwest Colorado District, including the Little Snake Field Office, the BLM office responsible for Sand Wash Basin.

The Northwest RAC currently has only four seats of the Conservation and Non Commodity Interests category filled. We will omit their names but show 3 seats for dispersed recreation and 1 seat for Archaeological/Historical. There is 1 vacant seat. The wild horses that call Sand Wash Basin home are not currently represented by a stakeholder in the Northwest RAC. As RAC members are appointed by the Secretary of the Interior, we can only speculate as to why that is. 

Interested in representing wild horse and burro interests on the Northwest Colorado Resource Advisory Council? Individuals may nominate themselves when BLM opens a nomination period. Learn more about the Northwest RAC and the application process through the Bureau of Land Management. 



Official BLM RAC application:

Apply to Serve on a BLM Resource Advisory Council

Northwest Colorado RAC page:

Colorado Northwest Resource Advisory Council

Now let’s talk about the wild horse and burro population itself.

According to BLM’s latest published range estimate, as of March 1, 2026, there are an estimated 85,466 wild horses and burros on BLM managed public lands. This number is broken out with 61,523 wild horses and 23,943 wild burros. The combined AMLs for all BLM HMAs is 25,592 animals. 

Colorado’s specific estimate is 1,669, with a statewide AML of 817 across the four HMAs in the state. Colorado’s HMAs are Sand Wash Basin, Piceance/East Douglas, Spring Creek, and Little Book Cliffs. 

Sounds like a lot but what about the animals currently in holding in the BLM care? How many are there? Keep in mind, this number changes constantly as we are here talking about round ups, which result in adoption events. 

As of May 2026, BLM reports a total of 58,025 animals in holding. BLM themselves reported in February of 2026 that more than 63,000 horses and burros were in its facilities. That is a substantial change in three short months. We’d like to see a clear accounting of the placements, transfers, deaths, and other changes that account for the difference of 4,975 animals, but we digress. 



Managing this system comes with substantial cost. Congress appropriated 142 million for BLM’s Wild Horse and Burro Management Program in 2025. In 2024, the actual expenditures were approximately 153 million, with roughly 101 million spent on off range holding alone.



To summarize this cost, the BLM spent approximately 8 million dollars gathering and removing animals from public lands in 2024 alone and over 101 million caring for animals currently in holding. 

This alone should make folks think: Isn’t there a better way?

One of the biggest questions facing this program is whether more resources should be spent preventing population growth before horses have to be permanently removed. Removing a horse or burro is only the beginning of the government’s financial responsibility for that animal. If it isn’t adopted or sold, the federal government may be responsible for its care for years. 

Fertility control offers a different strategy: reduce reproduction on the range so fewer horses ultimately need to be removed and placed into lifetime care. The BLM itself acknowledges that expanded fertility control has the potential to reduce long term costs. While the BLM administers some fertility control treatment itself, it also relies substantially on trained volunteers, partners, state funded professional darters and contractors. 

For Colorado, the volunteer role is significant. BLM reported that wild horse partner groups contributed more than 15,000 volunteer hours in 2024, spending time identifying, tracking, and darting horses. Sand Wash Basin is a good example of this. BLM stated in July 2025 that fertility control there was “primarily administered by volunteers from the Sand Wash Advocacy Team and by professional darters, whose positions are funded by the State of Colorado”. 

Wait, did you say funded by the State of Colorado? For a federally funded program? Let’s talk about that. 

In August of 2021, BLM announced an emergency round up of Sand Wash Basin horses, citing severe drought, inadequate forage, and a population above AML (We'd like to add here that a few short weeks after the 2021 roundup, hundreds of sheep were happily munching away on the inadequate forage, as shown below). Its original plan was to round up 783 horses and return 50, 25 of which would be treated with fertility control. 

The helicopter removal generated substantial public opposition. Colorado Governor Jared Polis publicly asked the BLM for a six month pause on wild horse round ups, although the BLM proceeded with the helicopter round up. 



Nevertheless, the state became directly involved while the round up was underway. BLM ultimately stopped the round up earlier than planned. Its September 13, 2021, announcement stated, “With input from the State of Colorado we were able to end the Sand Wash gather earlier than expected.” The BLM announced it intended to work with Colorado on fertility control, water and fencing improvements, smaller bait/trap removals, and recruiting and training fertility control volunteers. 

The state of Colorado's involvement came about due to thousands of communications sent to our public officials by concerned citizens. When you feel as though your voice doesn’t matter, please remember this. There are more horses free on the range today because of thousands of voices joined together. 

Another problem with the BLM management of horses became very visible, following the 2021 round up. An equine influenza outbreak at the Canon City BLM holding facility where the Sand Wash and other Colorado horses were in holding killed nearly 100 horses in less than a week, with the final number of deaths reported at 146. 

Advocates for Colorado’s horses did not let up. In 2023, Colorado put money and law behind their role to work with the BLM.

On May 20, 2023, Governor Polis signed Senate Bill 23-275 into law. The law committed 1.5 million to the Colorado Wild Horse Project Fund. It appropriated $400,000 specifically for fertility control population management. Colorado can’t take control from the BLM, this is still federal land and horses. Instead, the infrastructure was created to support and influence management in cooperation with the BLM. SB 23-275 created a state framework around three major ideas: fertility control, on range stewardship, and humane alternatives for horses removed from the range.

It also created the Colorado Wild Horse Working Group, bringing together state officials, legislators, advocates, ranching interests and others: BLM and Colorado’s Ute tribes were also authorized to participate. The group was directed to examine alternatives for off range horses, including a possible state preserve, sanctuaries, adoption support and other partnerships. 



It also addressed something the BLM already admitted and Colorado had seen firsthand: fertility control heavily depended on volunteers. Sand Wash Advocate Team (SWAT) had been administering PZP in Sand Wash Basin since 2014. Colorado’s Department of Agriculture now describes its state program as an effort to stabilize herd numbers and reduce the cycle of population growth followed by round ups. 

Important to note that the Colorado Working Group itself is advisory and cannot bind either state or federal government. However, there is still power here. Colorado lawmakers themselves wrote the recent large helicopter round ups into their findings explaining why the state needed to act. 

That brings us to a very hot topic: Helicopter round ups. 

Helicopters have become one of the most visible and controversial tools used to manage America’s wild horses. Their use was not authorized in the original 1971 Wild Free Roaming Horses and Burros Act. In fact, the earlier law from 1959 prohibited using aircraft or motorized vehicles to hunt wild horses on public land. Congress later changed federal law in 1976, expressly authorizing the use of helicopters in wild horse management. So yes, as it stands today, using helicopters is legal. 

BLM supports helicopter “gathers”. They argue they provide an efficient way to locate and gather large numbers of animals spread out across thousands of acres. The BLM maintains that helicopter round ups are humane and can have relatively low rates of serious injury or death. 



Opponents of helicopter round ups question how chasing a wild animal with a helicopter can ever be considered the most humane management option. Beyond death, and yes, it has happened, opponents point to fear, exertion, separation of family bands, injuries, stress, terrain, and the transition from free roaming into corrals and transportation as direct issues of this method. It doesn’t stop there. Many injuries, often resulting in euthanasia, occur in the corrals, trailers, and pens the horses are kept in. 

But let’s not turn this into a BLM vs Advocate debate, as it usually goes online. Let’s again review the BLM documentation regarding helicopters.

 

BLM’s own policy explicitly anticipates gather related injuries. It requires injuries requiring veterinary examination or treatment, deaths, and spontaneous abortions to be recorded in gather reports. It also provides procedures for animals that become injured or distressed during gather operations. This directly acknowledges that animal advocate concerns are valid. 

The problem with this is that if the BLM doesn’t have a veterinarian on site during "gathers", then they can’t examine the animal. If that doesn’t happen, well then, we guess it’s not required to be included in the gather report. And make no mistake, veterinarians are not always on site, such as the 2026 Sand Wash Basin round up. 



Going back to the 2021 Sand Wash Basin round up, the BLM reported two deaths as “non-gather related”. That is interesting. In the 2022 Piceance/East Douglas round up, the BLM reported 6 deaths, all of which they classified as pre-existing conditions.

We never knew a helicopter chasing an animal down was a pre-existing condition, but there you go.

So far, we’ve only talked about death recorded during round ups, so let’s now take a moment to talk about just a few injuries that have occurred. 

• Twin Peaks HMA, October 2024: 3 year old mare broke her neck after running into a panel during sorting. 
• Sulphur HMA, February 2022: 18 year old stallion broke his neck after hitting a panel during sorting. 
• Cedar Mountain HMA, September 2022: 16 year old stallion fractured his neck after hitting a panel during sorting.
• North Lander, July 2024: Foal found in temporary holding with a broken leg and euthanized. 
• Checkerboard, September 2014: Yearling colt found dead in holding after suffering from an acute neck injury from running into the panels. 
• Little Book Cliffs, September 2024: 24 year old mare euthanized after suffering an acute injury to right rear leg. 



I want us to stay on this for a moment. These examples are but a few of the horrendous injuries the wild horses have endured. These are not anecdotal stories from advocates; these are directly from BLM documentation.

That last one really gets us. A 24 year old mare that has lived successfully wild her whole life and is entering into her twilight years was chased from her home and injured her knee. Just like that, her life is gone. For what? She is well past reproduction age and therefore is not adding to the population on the range. 

The risks associated with helicopter round ups are not merely theoretical.

The BLM’s own reports document horses suffering serious injuries during capture and handling. The BLM summarizes an average mortality rate of 1 in every 300 captured, for .33%. More recent helicopter “assisted” operations have averaged about .5% mortality. Mortality and injury are not the same measurement. A mortality rate tells us how many animals die from gather related injuries; it does not by itself tell us how many animals were injured but survived, or measure other welfare effects associated with pursuit, capture, sorting, temporary holding, and transportation. As citizens whose tax payer dollars pay for this program, we are not comfortable with any mortality rate being acceptable at all for a federally protected animal.

The BLM states that is committed to the operational transparency of its helicopter assisted wild horse and burro gathers, asserting that it welcomes the public and media to observe these operations from designated viewing areas. BLM’s previous national gather policy explicitly stated: Every gather day is considered a public observation day. It described its purpose as providing safe and transparent visitation by the public/media. 

For the 2026 Sand Wash Basin round up, BLM specifically offered designated observation days and expressly reserved the ability to cancel them because of weather, safety, changing gather locations or operational limitations. On September 19, BLM said operations continued but public observation was canceled because of flooding, washouts and impassable roads. They never offered the last day as an option for the public to sign up.

Did they stop the round up? No.

We advocate for moving away from a roundup method that carries a documented risk of injury and death. Ultimately, we advocate for ending the use of helicopters in wild horse roundups altogether.

But as long as helicopter roundups continue, we believe the public should be able to fully see and understand how they are conducted.

BLM maintains that helicopter gathers are humane and safe. If that is the agency's position, greater transparency should reinforce it, not threaten it.

As taxpayers and members of the public, we would like to see comprehensive video documentation of helicopter roundup operations. BLM personnel, contractors, and other parties, directly involved in the capture and handling of horses should wear body cameras, with additional cameras mounted on appropriate equipment. That footage should be available through livestreaming or timely public release.

When a horse is seriously injured, euthanized or dies during an operation, the corresponding footage should be preserved and made available to the public, subject to legitimate legal and safety restrictions.

This would accomplish two things. It would allow BLM to maintain its responsibility to keep public observers and media a safe distance from active operations while providing meaningful public visibility. It would also create an objective record that could either substantiate concerns about animal treatment or protect BLM employees and contractors from allegations that the evidence does not support.

If these operations are humane and safe, transparency should help demonstrate that.

And while we have relied heavily on BLM's own documentation throughout this discussion, there is another side to helicopter roundups that statistics and agency reports do not always capture: what happens to individual horses and their family bands.

In 2021, during the Sand Wash Basin roundup, mare Sitara and her three month old colt, Cassini, were pursued during the helicopter operation. During the roundup, Cassini became separated from his mother.

Think about what that means for a three month old colt on the range. We have already discussed concerns about forage and resources. At that age, remaining with his mother can still be critically important.

Cassini was later found with stallion Motor. Over the years that followed, photographers who knew these horses continued documenting him, allowing pieces of his story to be put together. Cassini survived the 2021 roundup and the years that followed. We have to add here though that he again faced a helicopter round up in September of 2026. He is one of the fortunate ones who avoided the helicopters both times. We'd like for him to never have to face them again in his lifetime.

Stories like his are also a reminder that mortality statistics cannot tell us everything about the impact of a roundup. A horse does not have to die for an operation to profoundly alter its life or the structure of its family band.

There is another concern that deserves attention: what happens after horses enter the trap and holding areas.

Wild stallions have spent their lives navigating relationships with other stallions while protecting their family bands. On the range, confrontations can involve posturing, threats and brief physical encounters, but horses also have space to disengage and move away. During a roundup, unfamiliar or competing stallions may instead be concentrated into confined sorting and holding areas where those opportunities are limited.



That raises an important animal welfare question: If confinement itself creates additional opportunities for conflict, stress or injury, how should the capture, sorting and holding process be designed differently to reduce those risks?



That is the kind of question we believe deserves more attention. It deserves documentation, transparency and continued evaluation of whether there is a better way.

Does the BLM fly the helicopters themselves?

Well, let’s talk about that next. When a BLM helicopter appears over a wild horse herd for the sole purpose of driving them across rough terrain into a trap, the pilot is not necessarily a federal employee. The federal government contracts much of this work to private companies. One of the most prominent is the Cattoor Livestock Roundup, Inc., a family run company based in Utah that has performed wild horse round ups for the federal government for decades. 

Side note: The BLM consistently calls round ups "gathers". We aren't sure why but suspect they like to soften the wording a bit, make it more palatable to the public. So it's amusing to us that they contract a company with the word "roundup" in their name. But, we digress.

According to the BLM, Cattoor has been rounding up wild horses for the agency since 1975. This long relationship has not been without controversy. In 1992, founder Dave Cattoor pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor count of “Use of Aircraft to Capture Wild Horses”. This was during his work for the Duckwater Indian Tribe in Nevada on non BLM land. The issue reportedly involved wild horses being captured and ultimately shipped to a Texas slaughter facility.

Congressional testimony later specifically raised Cattoor’s conviction and questioned why the BLM continued using him as a contractor. The BLM maintained that the conviction was not for animal cruelty (never mind where these poor horses were ending up) and still considered Cattoor a valid contractor. 

In 1991, another wild horse contractor challenged BLM’s decision to award a Nevada round up contract to Cattoor. The Government Accountability Office reviewed the complaint. The competing contractor offered a lower price, approximately $67.12 per animal compared to Cattoor’s $85.28, but the BLM still awarded the higher contract. GAO upheld the award. 



The relationship between the federal government and this family run business goes back decades. Just how much of tax payer dollars are going into the pocket of this company? An analysis of federal contracting records published by the American Wild Horse Campaign found that Cattoor received approximately 26.2 million from 153 BLM contracts beginning in 2006, plus approximately 2.4 million from 5 U.S. Forest Service contracts and another 2.2 million in other federal contracts. Keep in mind, this is data from 2006 and their relationship goes back to 1975. 

Let’s also not confuse these numbers with the current contract numbers. 

A contract awarded to Cattoor in 2020 had a ceiling of 9.4 million, with 8.3 million obligated under it. In 2022, a 10 million dollar contract was awarded and in 2023, a 20 million dollar contract was awarded. In 2025, BLM awarded yet another contract to the Cattoor’s for indefinite delivery for wild horse and burro drive trapping services with a potential value of up to 72 million. Keep in mind, we are only talking about contracts awarded to Cattoor, not all round up companies.

When the BLM talks about how expensive fertility treatment is and relies on private citizens to volunteer their time to administer fertility treatment, please remember these numbers. Understand why that narrative can be perceived as smoke and mirrors from the BLM. In fiscal year 2024, approximately two thirds of Wild Horse and Burro Program expenditures went to off range holding alone. That raises a legitimate question: what would the long term financial impact be if substantially more resources were directed toward preventing population growth before removal becomes necessary? 



Helicopter round ups are what they have chosen to spend our tax payer dollars on. The federal government has chosen for decades to spend money on round ups, removal, and holding, rather than preventing the need for their removal in the first place. They have also chosen to continually employ a company that has no qualms about rounding up horses who are slated for the slaughter pipeline and in fact, has pleaded guilty of their involvement in that endeavor.

This leads me to the next point that gets perpetuated online repeatedly: Wild horses are rounded up by the BLM specifically to send to slaughter.

This is not the case. However, there is documented evidence going back decades that federally protected wild horses have entered commercial slaughter pipelines after leaving federal ownership. This isn’t based on advocacy investigations; the Government Accountability Office and the Department of the Interior Inspector General have documented it. 

The pathway to slaughter: A horse gathered from an HMA remains federally protected while it is owned by the federal government. BLM may place the horse in holding and then offer it for adoption or in some cases, for sale. 

With adoptions, BLM retains ownership for at least one year. After the adopter demonstrates appropriate care, BLM issues the title. At that moment, the horse becomes private property and is no longer protected as a federal wild horse. This sounds legitimate without further scrutiny, but it is riddled with documented problems. 

In 1990, the GAO investigated a BLM waiver adoption program and found widespread commercial exploitation. Investigators obtained 3,751 BLM wild horse titles from just four slaughterhouses in Nebraska and Texas. GAO found that some agents sold as many as 99% of the horses they acquired, many within 30 days of receiving the title. GAO’s conclusion stated, “thousands of horses” were sent to slaughter after title pass. 



More recently in 2015, the Department of the Interior’s Office of Inspector General investigated a Colorado livestock hauler Tom Davis. Between 2008 and 2012, Davis purchased approximately 1,700 BLM wild horses. During the federal investigation, Davis admitted that most of those horses went to slaughter. He denied personally transporting them directly to slaughter, but the Inspector General concluded that most ultimately entered the slaughter pipeline. 

Keep in mind, the BLM already had policies in place intended to prevent federally protected animals from being sold for slaughter. 

Fast forward to 2019 when the BLM launched the $1,000 Adoption Incentive Program. Instead of someone paying to only adopt a horse, the government offered adopters an incentive of up to $1,000 per animal. Subsequent investigations by the American Wild Horse Campaign/Conservation alleged that some participants were essentially adopting horses, maintaining until title, collecting the incentive, then disposing them through livestock auctions and kill pens. Its 19 month investigation reported finding at least 840 BLM horses and burros at slaughter auctions or kill pens after the incentive program began. 



In case you’re wondering, the BLM itself defines a kill pen as a livestock holding facility where horses acquired by slaughter buyers are held before being transported for export to slaughter plants outside the United States.

Kill pens are exactly what you would imagine when you see the words. Think of them as a waiting room for unwanted horses and discarded livestock. You can imagine that there isn't a good reason to take care of the animals in those pens when they're slated for slaughter anyways. All because someone decided living, sentient beings had more value dead than alive.



Aside from that, we personally know several amazing adopters and their account of the BLM vetting process varies widely, if it happens at all, within the state of Colorado. This gives us the opinion that although the BLM has formal guidelines and procedures in place to ensure adopters are appropriately vetted, many times this does not actually happen. 

The last thing we want to address in this post is the extreme rhetoric we see from both sides of this issue online.

Every round up brings out the keyboard warriors. Political rants. Blanket hatred of the BLM. People wishing helicopters would crash or harm would come to those involved. None of that helps these horses.

The hostility certainly isn't limited to one side. We see an incredible amount of contempt directed toward the people who care about wild horses. Anyone questioning the BLM management can quickly be dismissed as an emotional, uninformed horse advocate who doesn't understand rangeland management. Horse lovers are blamed for caring too much, knowing too little, or somehow loving these animals at the expense of everything else that shares the landscape.



All of that adds noise to an issue that deserves a much more thoughtful conversation.

Let’s be clear about where we stand.

We, Weekend Vibes Photography, do not hate the BLM or the people who work for it. We don't wish harm on anyone. We don't condone threats, violence or illegal activity, and we certainly don't wish for helicopters to crash.

We also don't place this issue at the doorstep of any single president, political party or administration. As we've documented throughout this post, the problems surrounding federal wild horse management have developed over decades, through changing laws, policies, administrations and leadership.



But rejecting hatred and extremism does not mean we won't criticize the system. 

Good citizens should show basic human decency of respecting the people working within an agency while questioning the decisions that agency makes. We can acknowledge that wild horses require responsible management while questioning how population targets are established. We can recognize that BLM has a difficult multiple use mandate while asking whether livestock, wildlife, and wild horses are receiving an equitable share of public resources. And we can strongly oppose helicopter round ups while advocating for practical alternatives such as fertility control, bait trapping, and greater investment in on range management.

Those aren't contradictions. That's what informed advocacy should look like.

We encourage you to be a voice advocating for our wild horses. We are including contact information below for both the Colorado State BLM offices and Colorado’s Senators, as well as sample letter templates.



Please note: these are specific to Colorado’s horses and more specifically, Sand Wash Basin. Please feel free to edit this verbiage in your advocacy for your local HMAs.

Who to Contact

Bureau of Land Management: Colorado State Office

Attn: State Director

Email: blm_co_statedirector@blm.gov

CC: blm_co_info@blm.gov

Phone: (303) 239-3700

Mailing Address:

Bureau of Land Management Colorado State Office

Denver Federal Center, Building 40

PO Box 151029

Lakewood, CO 80225

BLM Colorado State Office Website

Bureau of Land Management: Little Snake Field Office

Attn: Field Manager

Email: BLM_CO_LSFO_Web@blm.gov

Phone: (970) 826-5000

Mailing Address:

Little Snake Field Office

455 Emerson Street

Craig, CO 81625

BLM Little Snake Field Office Website

Contact Colorado's U.S. Senators

Colorado residents can also contact their U.S. senators regarding federal wild horse and public land management issues.

Senator Michael Bennet

Denver Office

Cesar E. Chavez Memorial Building

1244 Speer Boulevard

Denver, CO 80204

Phone: (303) 455-7600

Washington, D.C. Office

261 Russell Senate Office Building

Washington, DC 20510

Phone: (202) 224-5852

Online Contact:

Write to Senator Michael Bennet

Federal Agency Assistance:

Request Help With a Federal Agency

Senator John Hickenlooper

Denver Office

Byron Rogers Federal Building

1961 Stout Street, Suite 12-300

Denver, CO 80294

Phone: (303) 244-1628

Casework Email: casework@hickenlooper.senate.gov

Washington, D.C. Office

Phone: (202) 224-5941

Online Contact:

Write to Senator John Hickenlooper

Federal Agency Assistance:

Request Help With a Federal Agency