The Bureau of Land Management announced $30 million would go toward fertility control efforts to manage wild horses this week, marking a rare moment of agreement in a decades-old, heated debate.
“The American people have asked for more fertility control in wild horse and burro management, and the Department of the Interior is prepared to deliver,” BLM's Monday press release stated.
“The passion shown by the American people for safeguarding the Spirit of the West continues to guide and energize this work,” said Interior Secretary Doug Burgum.
BLM says wild horse herds can double within four to five years, and their overabundance affects range health. Its primary method to bring down numbers is removing animals from the range, often by chasing them into corrals with helicopters. The horses are then put in holding facilities and some are offered for adoption.
But this system is costly, with a 2025 budget of $142 million. Holding tens of thousands of horses and burros off range is the most expensive part. Last year, the government paid roughly $2.35 per horse per day in long-term holding facilities and $6.00 per horse per day in short-term facilities, designed to get them ready for adoption, according to the Congressional Research Service.
Advocates have long argued that injecting horses with fertility vaccines to limit reproduction would be easier on the animals (it’s fairly common for small numbers of horses and burros to die during roundups) and cheaper.
Patricia Miller, the executive director of American Wild Horse Conservation, which advocates for the protection of wild horses, welcomed the agency’s announcement, which was made following a roundtable event in Washington, D.C., with federal agencies and horse advocacy groups, including hers.
Miller called the move “a meaningful commitment to proactive on-range management that we have been longing for and are very excited about,” adding that it “will help remove the current roundup-warehouse system that we're in today.”
The press release did not say how the funding, which comes from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, could be used and BLM staff did not respond to questions before deadline. Miller said her understanding is that the money could help train more people to administer the birth-control-like fertility vaccines in the field and expand efforts in some of the most remote parts of the West.
However, the BLM refuted claims that it hasn’t done enough to advance fertility control.
“Some advocates claim the BLM has ‘ignored cheap fertility control options for 20 years,’ but that is not true,” the agency wrote in its press release, noting that it treated 921 mares with fertility treatments last year. But the scale of its roundups is much larger, with 7,853 animals removed from the range last year.
The agency emphasized that there are limits to the fertility control method.
“Fertility treatments alone cannot shrink an already overpopulated herd, and slowing growth requires treating about 75% of mares every single year, something not feasible across most of the vast, rugged western landscapes,” the press release stated.
Operations to round up and remove groups of wild horses will continue in order to reach sustainable herd sizes, BLM said, with gathers this month in Colorado, Idaho, Nevada and Wyoming.
Earlier this month, Colorado Gov. Jared Polis called for an immediate halt to helicopter roundups, after nine horses died during one this summer.
Despite Polis' ask, BLM went forward with its next helicopter-driven gather in the northwest part of the state, in which it aims to remove about 245 wild horses from the range. Polis said fertility control is a better approach.
“By growing resources, partnerships, and collaboration and bringing key experts to the table, we can increase the use of fertility control and avoid future helicopter gathers,” Polis said in a statement this week. “I am appreciative that the BLM is investing in humane and proactive measures to protect wild horses and Colorado communities.”
This story was produced by the Mountain West News Bureau, a collaboration between Boise State Public Radio, Wyoming Public Media, Nevada Public Radio, KUNR in Nevada, KUNC in Northern Colorado, KANW in New Mexico, Colorado Public Radio and KJZZ in Arizona as well as NPR, with support from affiliate newsrooms across the region. Funding for the Mountain West News Bureau is provided in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and Eric and Wendy Schmidt.
