By Michelle Baker
Wild horse advocates shouldn’t have been surprised by the roundups that removed 24 horses from an area in southeast Reno on Aug. 7 and 8, according to Nevada Department of Agriculture Director J.J. Goicoechea.
“Our cooperator [Wild Horse Connection] was aware that if they weren’t successful in removing the horses, the NDA would remove the horses,” he .
For two weeks, three entities worked cooperatively to lure the horses from the property lines to a new water source to the north: The NDA, which legally owns the horses; Wild Horse Connection, which is responsible management of the herd; and Sunny Hills Ranchos, the development company that owns the land adjacent to the range and where the horses’ source of water has been for years.
Advocates said the biggest issue was the lack of communication that roundups were going to take place. Wild Horse Connection had been actively working with the developer, Sunny Hills Ranchos, to remove the horses from their property and move them to the new water source near Alexander Lake Road.
Tracy Wilson, Nevada state director of American Wild Horse Conservation, said convincing the horses to move from their original water source would not be an overnight ordeal.
“The horses didn’t want to go to the north, which was Plan A,” Wilson said in an interview when the roundups were taking place. “As usual, we always have multiple plans in place.”
Plan B, Wilson said, was to use a higher value hay—a suggestion from the NDA Virginia Range Manager—which successfully got all of the horses out of property lines and back onto the range.
“These horses are permanently removed from the range.”
According to Wilson, after managing to remove all of the horses from the property, advocates were unable to keep the horses out due to boulders put in place by the developers —previously used to preserve access to the water source for the horses, but now un-needed—which they said blocked the complete closure of the gate. Advocates claim they couldn’t keep the gate closed, and the horses got back in. They said they contacted the developer to remove the boulders.
“The next thing we knew, they had the gate locked and the NDA was here collecting horses,” Wilson said in a previous interview with This Is Reno. “We’re really just disappointed because there was no communication that there was going to be a permanent removal.”
When asked about any communication between the NDA and Wild Horse Connection about the imminent roundups, Goicoechea said that, per the agreement the NDA has with the nonprofit, if Wild Horse Connection was unable to remove the horses off of Sunny Hills Ranchos’ property within the agreed-upon time, the horses would be removed.
“According to our cooperative agreement with Wild Horse Connection, any horses that are removed from the range, either by them or by the NDA, they are removed from the range, and they do not return to the range,” Goicoechea said. “That agreement was signed last September and that has been in place.”
One of the advocates’ biggest asks is for the NDA to return the horses to the Alexander Lake Road area of the range, where an alternative water source has been developed in anticipation of moving the horses away from the development and their original water source, Steamboat Creek. Goicoechea said this is not a possibility.
“So, these horses are permanently removed from the range,” Goicoechea said. “Again, according to the cooperative agreement, the horses, unfortunately, have been habituated to that property. They are being illegally fed there, and so that is becoming a problem for the horses and for the general public. Once they are used to receiving feed in that area, they’re not going to return to the range as they should and forage on the range.”
The horses are currently at Northern Nevada Correctional Facility until they’re able to be put up for adoption.
