One advocate shouted “baby killer!” at Day after attacking her about fertility darts during a wild horse adoption event the Piceance Mustangs held in Craig last month. They are often, too, the target of criticism from national and local mustang advocacy groups who are fiercely opposed to helicopter roundups and question the safety of fertility-control vaccines. How often the darts successfully prevent pregnancy. How long the fertility vaccine can prevent a mare from getting pregnant. And assisted in roundups by telling the BLM which horses they want released back to the land for genetic diversity. Removed old fences that trip and injure the horses. Their group, along with similar groups at the three other herd management areas in western Colorado, does the work needed to keep horses alive during drought years and, in general, makes horse management easier on the BLM. The horses end up in holding pens, including on state prison grounds in Cañon City, where 145 mustangs died last summer from the typically preventable equine flu.ĭay, Degonia and the rest of the 50 or so Piceance Mustangs volunteers represent the middle ground - they are horse lovers and, at the same time, partners of the Bureau of Land Management. This is a pretty typical day for her on the Western Colorado rangeland, about an hour outside of Meeker.įertility control is an oft-touted solution for the wild horse and burro overpopulation problem, which for decades has pitted mustang advocates against federal regulators at the Bureau of Land Management who have rounded up 1,500 wild horses in Colorado since 2021. In five hours in the Piceance, Day managed to dart just one mare.
TOP: Cindy Day fills a dart with fertility -control vaccine on the Piceance-East Douglas Herd Management Area, June 21, near Meeker BOTTOM: Wild horses watch the Jeep while a dart gun is pointed in their direction. Volunteers darting wild horses with fertility doses to manage population Close
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