BLM Program Support

HEALTH, HANDLING, AND WELFARE

Health, Handling, and WelfareHealth, Handling, and Welfare

BLM managers should rely on the best, most current information to maintain WHB health and welfare. The BLM needs to provide the best and most humane care and handling for healthy WHB. Most animal care is in a corral or pasture setting, but some is also on-the-range and during gathers. The BLM’s capture methods have historically led to good animal welfare outcomes, especially when compared against wildlife capture operations (Scasta 2020), but the agency always aims to improve. There are some health, handling and welfare issues arise that are specific to WHB, and which may require dedicated research efforts.

SOPs: IM 2021-002, Wild Horse and Burro comprehensive animal welfare program. This is the Comprehensive Animal Welfare Program and contains standards for animal welfare.

BLM contact: Jerrie Bertola, HQ260 CAWP lead

Key Papers:

Henneke, D.R., G.D. Potter, J.L Kreider, and B.F. Yeates. 1983. Relationship between condition score, physical measurements and body fat percentage in mares. Equine Veterinary Journal 15:371-372.

Holcomb, K.E., and C.S. Stull. 2016. Effect of time and weather on preference, frequency, and duration of shade use by horses. Journal of Animal Science 94:1653-1661.

Scasta, J.D. 2020. Mortality and operational attributes relative to feral horse and burro capture techniques based on publicly available data from 2010-2019. Journal of Equine Veterinary Science 86:102893.

BLM Blog post about overall safety of WHB gather, based on Scasta (2019): https://www.blm.gov/blog/2022-02-18/numbers-dont-lie-how-blm-safely-gathers-thousands-wild-horses-and-burros-every-year

This file contains a recent literature review on the effects of gathers, handling, and removal. It is suitable to include in environmental assessments that consider alternatives with gathers and / or removals.

This file contains a literature review on the effects of fitting WHBs with GPS radio collars or GPS radio-telemetry tail tags. It is suitable to include in environmental assessments that consider using these telemetry devices for monitoring animal movements and condition, or research. 

If you use this literature review in your NEPA, you should also download this pdf, which has all the cited references compiled. Include these in your administrative record. And, make these available for the public to read in your Field Office public room during your comment period. But do not distribute this pdf to the public electronically, because many of the papers here are copyrighted and the BLM does not have a distribution license to share those with the public.