Legal Win and Matching Fund Challenge, and much more!!
|
|
|
|
|
|
A beautiful Virginia Range paint wild horse taking a sunbath!!!! Photo compliments of Sundance Digital Studio
|
|
CAN YOU HELP US RAISE $5,000 FOR FENCING AT THE NEW SANCTUARY?
|
As many of you know, we are raising funds to help build the new sanctuary for our rescued horses. It will be a place where we can ensure they are safe, receive the training they need, and get our adoption program into full swing!!!! You’re invited to become a volunteer to help us work with the horses, clean up, feed, water, and ride fence lines, help with rangeland rehabilitation, to name just a few of the major activities that will be going on at the ranch!
We have been contacted by an anonymous donor who wishes to see us spurred along in acquiring the materials to complete the section of fencing needed to move our horses on to the property!!!! This donor has asked that the gift be presented as a
matching fund challenge and has pledged to gift Hidden Valley Wild Horse Protection Fund the equivalent of what we can raise, up to the amount of $5,000. What does this mean? This is an incredible opportunity for you to take part in shaping the future safe haven for the wild horses of the historic Virginia Range. Take this opportunity to have your extremely generous donation matched, dollar for dollar, to meet our goal of raising $5,000 or more!!
All the funds we raise from this challenge will go to pay for supplies needed to complete the current fencing projects at the sanctuary!!!! One roll of 2-strand twisted barbless wire costs $70, one mile of barbless wire costs approximately $1,120, one mile of t-posts will cost approximately $1,320 or $4.00 each, while one (¼ mile) section of fencing will cost about $610 in materials.
Please don’t let this amazing matching fund opportunity slip away. Double your impact on this fencing project by donating today! This matching fund challenge will be open through the end of this month, October 31, 2017.
To volunteer for projects going on at the new sanctuary, contact us at
hiddenvalleywildhorses@gmail.com
We’ll be doing rangeland rehabilitation to the burned areas, designing animal management areas, installing fencing, and many other incredible, fun projects!!!!
Thank You,
Audrey, Kathryn and Geoff
Legislative Engagement
|
|
|
From
ASPCA
We know this summer has been a rollercoaster ride of emails, phone calls, blogs, newscasts and social media posts about the status of protection for America's wild and domestic horses and burros. We appreciate you hanging in there with us and staying true to our mission during these busy months!
Amendments banning horse slaughter and protecting our wild horses and burros have been proposed, debated, re-proposed and voted on in various committees. Even though this legislation has been through many stages, we still sit in a moment of uncertainty. Below you can find a quick recap of the issues themselves, and advice on what you, as a top horse advocate, can do going forward.
We must continue to raise our voices for horses and press on as a herd.
Horse Protection: Both Wild and Domestic
Wild Horses and Burros
After decades of federal protection, tens of thousands of our wild horses and burros may be killed due to a shocking vote by the House Appropriations Committee to remove this protection. Earlier this year the Department of Interior released a budget proposal that encouraged the killing and commercial slaughter of these icons of the American West. Although our amendment to ban the use of federal funds to kill wild horses and burros was submitted to the House Rules Committee for consideration by the full House, the committee blocked it.
Killing is not a solution, and Congress needs to hear that Americans will not forgive or forget this betrayal of our treasured herds. We cannot let this happen.
Domestic Horses
Every year since 2007, with the exception of 2011, Congress has approved an appropriations amendment (“defund language”) prohibiting the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) from using taxpayer dollars to inspect horse slaughter facilities. This provision effectively bars the grisly horse slaughter industry from setting up shop in the U.S. This year, however, the House Appropriations Committee narrowly defeated this amendment. Subsequently, the House Rules Committee refused to allow the full House to vote on the amendment, despite our clear forecast that the result would have been a landslide victory. Fortunately, the Senate Appropriations Committee voted to include thedefund language in its appropriations bill. That means this fight is not over! In the coming months, a joint House-Senate conference committee will decide whether the defund language will be part of the final combined bill.
If we lose that fight,
horse slaughter could return in a matter of months.
Take Action!
What can you do? Now that the Rules Committee has blocked both of our amendments from coming to the House Floor for a vote, we must focus on the House and Senate leaders. They will decide the fate of our nation’s horses. It is critical that your elected officials in Washington know that you want them to keep protecting American horses, both domestic and wild. Please take two actions to ensure that the federal government does not resurrect the nightmarish horse slaughter industry in our communities or exterminate wild horses in the West.
1.
Visit our
ASPCA Action Alert
to email your U.S. legislators
and urge them to support a ban on federal funding for horse slaughter
and
a prohibition on funds to kill healthy wild horses in the final FY 2018 Appropriations bill.
2.
Then, please place three quick, polite phone calls
: 1 to your representative in the U.S. House, and 1 to each of your two U.S. senators.
Find their names and numbers here
, and use the scripts below as a guide for your message.
- When calling your U.S. rep: “My name is [YOUR NAME] and I am from [CITY, STATE]. As your constituent, I strongly urge you to support language in the FY18 Appropriations bill to protect our nation’s horses from slaughter, and to save our wild horses from extermination. Please also reach out to leadership and urge them to support these protections. Thank you.”
-
- When calling your U.S. senators: “My name is [YOUR NAME] and I am from [CITY, STATE]. As your constituent and a strong supporter of equine welfare, I urge you to please support the Senate version of the Agriculture Appropriations bill, which prohibits the use of federal funds for horse slaughter. Please also support a provision in the Interior Appropriations bill to prohibit the use of our tax dollars to kill tens of thousands of wild horses and burros. Thank you.”
Please tell your neigh-bors, family and friends to do the same by sharing this
blog!
|
|
HELP US PURCHASE OUR WINTER HAY!!!
It's that time of year again when we need to get our winter feed and supplements delivered for our rescued horses.
Can you help us reach our goal of $12,600? We have already raised $1,925 toward this goal! No matter how small or large, please know your gift will go directly to our rescued horses in the form of delicious hay that gets them through our cold winter days and nights!
Because we work smarter, not harder, we have found the benefits of and resources to purchase big bales of hay which make our donated gifts go so much further! We pay the equivalent of only about $6 per 100lb bale when we feed these big bales!
Please help us reach our goal -
|
|
|
FROM THE CLOUD FOUNDATION – CONGRATULATIONS ON THE SAYLOR CREEK WIN!!!
And THANK YOU to Virginia and Jeff Hudson!!!!!!
BLM MAY NOT STERILIZE SAYLOR CREEK HORSES
The American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign, The Cloud Foundation and Return To Freedom with Virginia Hudson bring news to wild horse lovers throughout the country. What a difference a sound decision makes from Judge Lodge’s ruling in the Jarbidge case. The decision finds that the BLM violated NEPA in a variety of ways in deciding to sterilize the entire Saylor Creek herd. The court agreed that BLM violated NEPA by failing to consider the National Academy of Science (NAS) report, by failing to adequately respond to public comments, by failing to consider reasonable alternatives, and by failing to consider inconsistency between sterilization and the agency’s duties to maintain self-sustaining and free-roaming herds. This precedent setting decision is a major win in that it could make it difficult to sterilize healthy herds elsewhere in the west.
This case challenged a controversial and precedent-setting plan by the Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management (“BLM”) to permanently sterilize an entire herd of wild horses in the Saylor Creek Herd Management Area (“HMA”)—an action that would have disrupted and destroyed the natural, wild, and free-roaming behavior of these horses, as well as the social organization and long-term viability of the herd to which they belong. The BLM authorized sterilizing this wild horse herd in its recently approved Jarbidge Resource Management Plan (“RMP”).
“The Department of Interior (DOI) and Bureau of Land Management (BLM) violated NEPA in many aspects,” states Ginger Kathrens, Volunteer Executive Director of the Cloud Foundation. “They never considered direct, indirect, and cumulative impacts that sterilizing the entire herd will have on the behavior and physiology of wild horses and herd dynamics. “ The DOI and BLM violated NEPA by failing to consider a highly relevant technical report (the NAS Report) commissioned by the BLM itself from the National Research Council, a subsidiary of the National Academy of Sciences.
Lisa Friday, wild horse adopter and advocate states, “We have known for years what the NAS Report concluded, that ‘absence of young horses itself would alter the age structure of the population and could thereby affect harem dynamics.’ It is simply Unconscionable to tamper with the social dynamics that sterilization would cause.”
Judge Lodge’s decision states, “The BLM has not considered nor explained how the herd will maintain its wild horse instincts, behaviors, and social structure if it is entirely non-reproducing. Further, the BLM has not taken a hard look at how the introduction of horses from holding pens, where they may have become domesticated and reliant on humans, or from other herds that are unfamiliar with the area and terrain will impact the herd and its wild horse behaviors and survival instincts. In sum, the BLM has failed to consider, in the FEIS, any of these significant impacts on the Saylor Creek herd’s behaviors or on the HMAs environment itself. The Court therefore finds the BLM violated NEPA by failing to take the requisite “hard look” at these aspects of the decision.”
Most importantly, this precedent setting decision will allow for future decisions in the favor of horses that the BLM wishes to sterilize. “This decision recognizes that the BLM must carefully consider the harmful impacts of sterilization on wild horses’ behavior and herd dynamics,” said Nick Lawton, the attorney with the public interest law firm Meyer Glitzenstein & Eubanks, LLP who represented the plaintiffs. “This case underscores that wild horse advocates and courts will closely scrutinize the agency’s decisions.”
We will continue to do everything we can to protect our wild horse families and their legal right to live in peace and freedom. I would like to personally thank Virginia and Jeff Hudson for their hard work documenting the beautiful Saylor Creek Wild Horse Herd, states Ginger Kathrens.
Media Contact -
Lisa Friday
|
|
Come one, come all, and join the volunteers of Hidden Valley Wild Horse Protection Fund as
we join the Alliance of Wild Horse Advocates in the Nevada Day Parade – Saturday, October 28
th, rally time 8:00am in Carson City. We always have fun and enjoy gathering together with our friends from other organizations and across the range and sharing stories about the wild ones!!! We’ll be celebrating our upcoming Nevada Special License Plate. If you own and ride a former wild horse, you are invited to join the team and ride in the parade. If you’d like to join in the fun, please contact us at
hiddenvalleywildhorses@gmail.com and we’ll make sure you’re included and get the right information!
GET YOUR VERY OWN COPY OF THE ESSENTIAL HOOF BOOK BY SUSAN KAUFFMANN
Don’t miss out on this terrific opportunity to own one of the most comprehensive, well written, and helpful books ever published!!! Join author Susan Kauffman at Balance Point Training at 2955 Rhodes Road in south Reno off Old Hwy 395, Sunday, October 8
th from 2:00 – 4:00 pm for her premier book signing!
BLM HORSE ADOPTIONS IN CARSON CITY OCTOBER 14TH
Don’t miss the upcoming Northern Nevada Correctional Center BLM horse adoptions next weekend Saturday October 14
th. Bids for these horses start at only $150! This is your chance to own your very own special horse – a former wild one! Check out the catalog of horses up for adoption using the link below
OUR GRATITUDE TO THOSE WHO MAKE A DIFFERENCE FOR THE WILD ONES!
THANK YOU goes out to the
employees of the Henry Schein Company of Sparks, Nevada who honored the wild horses again this year with their September office fundraiser. Their efforts, generosity and kindness have contributed over $1,000 to help feed the wild ones this winter!!!!!!
THANK YOU goes out to those who have donated interesting, engaging, quality items to us to sell at the Wild Horse Meadow section of Foothill Feed and Mercantile at 1330 Geiger Grade Rd in south Reno. All proceeds go to benefit the wild horses. The most recent contributions are locally grown pumpkins!!!!!
THANK YOU goes out to the
Pregnant Mare Rescue in Watsonville, CA for the incredible donation of items for our wild horse herd at our new sanctuary - t-posts, water troughs, step posts, blankets, and other assorted items for our beautiful horses!!! Thank you so much Lynn!!!!
THANK YOU goes out to Mary Gomez and her hard working team of volunteers for putting on another amazing and very successful garage and hot dog sale at the annual Hidden Valley community garage sale. Their efforts paid off by raising $1,156!!!!
THANK YOU goes out to All About Equine Animal Rescue from for work with Picasso who they now call Blue! He is recovering nicely from surgery to remove a huge 7 pound lump of proudflesh from his rear pastern.
A REALLY GOOD READ ABOUT WILD HORSES ON THE RANGE
Our next meeting will be Thursday, October 26
th
6:15pm at South Valley library on Wedge Parkway.
For information on How to Adopt a Hidden Valley Wild Horse Protection Fund horse, visit
|
|
|
|
|
|
|