02/09/2025
Heber’s need your help.
🚨 Heber Wild Horse Territory Plan = A Blueprint for Extinction 🚨
If you care about the future of our Heber wild horses, it's time to speak up.
The Heber Wild Horse Territory Plan, recently proposed by the U.S. Forest Service, is being sold as “management.” But let’s call it what it really is: a plan for the extinction of the Heber wild horse herd.
Here’s why:
🐎 Drastic Population Cuts – The plan would slash the current herd down to as few as 50 horses. That’s far below the number needed for genetic diversity and long-term survival. Independent scientists agree: a wild horse herd needs a minimum of 150-200 individuals to remain viable. Anything less is a slow death sentence.
🛑 The plan includes fertility control measures that aim to stop nearly all reproduction. How can a herd survive if it can’t reproduce? It’s not management—it’s eradication through attrition.
🧬 No real safeguards to ensure the herd stays healthy and diverse because there is no way it can with so few horses left in the herd.
🏞️ Ignoring the Wild Horse Act – The Heber herd is protected under the 1971 Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act, which mandates that wild horses be managed as integral parts of our public lands. This plan violates both the spirit and the letter of that law.
💔 What’s worse? The Forest Service is basing its numbers on outdated data and prioritizing livestock grazing over the survival of a living symbol of the American West.
📣 If this plan goes through, we will be witnessing the deliberate erasure of the Heber wild horse herd.
Don’t let them disappear. Let your voice be heard. Unfortunately you can only submit an objection to the plan if you had previously submitted a comment during the Scoping process or the 2021 open comment period. However, you can write your representatives and share this post to be a voice for the Hebers.
“Objections will only be accepted from those who have previously submitted specific written comments regarding the proposed project during scoping or other designated opportunity for public comment in accordance with §218.5(a). Issues raised in objections must be based on previously submitted timely, specific written comments regarding the proposed project unless based on new information arising after the designated comment opportunities.” U.S. Forest Service
Objections, including attachments, must be filed via Public Comment Form at
https://cara.fs2c.usda.gov/Public/ReadingRoom?project=18916, or by mail to:
Michiko Martin, Reviewing Officer
Attn: Administrative Review Staff
USDA Forest Service, Southwestern Region
333 Broadway SE
Albuquerque, NM 87102
The Final EA and draft DN are available on-line at: https://www.fs.usda.gov/r03/apache-sitgreaves/projects/18916.
