| Achievements
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ISPMB is an empowering force influencing
global attitudes and catalyzing actions for the protection,
preservation and understanding of wild horses and burros
and their habitat.
The efforts of ISPMB’s first president, Velma (Wild Horse
Annie) Johnston, brought tremendous attention to public lands in
the West. The profound awareness that these lands belong to the
people of the United States resulted in sweeping changes and
legislation that resulted in protection not only to wild horses
and burros but also to the lands.
As the first wild horse and burro organization in the United
States, ISPMB provides the answer to a need for a sophisticated
advocacy program and public forum, receiving the support of
Congress that resulted in the passage of the Wild Free-Roaming
Horse and Burro Act of 1971. With well over 70 bills introduced
for wild horse and burro protection that year, the law passed
unanimously in both houses of Congress. This generated the largest
outpouring of mail in the history of Congress at that time. |
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In 1968, under a custodial agreement
with the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), "Wild Horse
Annie" accepted orphaned foals from the Pryor Mountains in
Montana and found homes for them. This unprecedented agreement
gave birth to the federal Adopt-A-Horse/Burro program in 1976
administered by the Bureau of Land Management. (Today, more than
200,000 wild horses and burros have been adopted through this
program.) |
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Recognizing the heritage of wild
horses and burros, "Wild Horse Annie" and the ISPMB were
instrumental in encouraging the federal government to establish
protective ranges for wild horses. The first range was established
in 1962 on Nellis Air Force Base in southern Nevada followed by
the Pryor Mt. Refuge in 1968 and Little Bookcliffs Refuge in
Colorado in 1985. (The latter was dedicated in memory of Wild
Horse Annie.) |
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Each of ISPMB’s presidents has been
appointed to the National Wild Horse and Burro Advisory Board and
served on the first three boards mandated by Congress. |
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ISPMB was instrumental in creating
educational workshops for potential wild horse and burro adopters
in 1985. These programs are now used nationally prior to wild
horse and burro adoptions in the U.S. |
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In 1988, ISPMB was commissioned by
the New Mexico BLM to conduct an evaluation of their wild horse
prison training programs. The report centers on the Las Lunas
facility and was later cited in the 1990 GAO Report on Wild
Horses. |
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In 1989, the ISPMB signed a historic
agreement with the BLM that created the first volunteer compliance
program in the United States, checking on the welfare of adopted
wild horses and burros |
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The ISPMB began an experimental
program in Arizona in 1990 purchasing titled BLM wild horses that
were destined for slaughter. Unable to monitor the auctions
throughout the entire state, the organization negotiated an
agreement with members of the horse slaughter trade allowing for
the total protection of all BLM wild horses and burros in the
state from 1995 to 2000. More than 100 adopted animals have been
saved and found permanent, responsible homes. In 2000, the ISPMB
relocated to South Dakota. |
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After the Good Friday massacre of 54
wild burros in the Black Mountains of Arizona, ISPMB raised the
largest reward in history at that time for information leading to
the arrest of conviction of the perpetrators. ($22,000) |
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With maximum fines of $500.00 for
crimes against wild horses and burros in Arizona’s federal
district, the ISPMB partnered with the BLM and through the
Sentencing Reform Act of 1988, was instrumental in raising fines
for violations of the 1971 Wild Horse and Burro Act. Penalties of
up to $100,000 per animal, per offense were the highest of any
federal district in the United States. Now all federal districts
carry the same penalties. |
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ISPMB’s participation was critical
to the success of one of the first ecosystem collaborative teams
created by then Secretary Babbitt in 1992. The Arizona Black
Mountain Ecoteam received the prestigious Health of the Land Award
from the Department of the Interior in 1996 for its tireless work
in creating a master model for management of burros in the United
States. |
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ISPMB has worked in Animal
Assisted Therapy (AAT) programs, in concert with several major
groups, involving interactions between wild horses and
disadvantaged youth and prison inmates. The programs were designed
to create positive educational experiences for the participants
and the horses. |
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1994-1997, the ISPMB, along with the
Department of the Army, the state of New Mexico and congressional
leaders successfully facilitated the adoption of nearly 1800
federally unprotected wild horses from White Sands Missile Range
in New Mexico. |
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In 1996, ISPMB paved the wave for the
protection of the Arizona Gila wild horses as wild free-roaming
horses under the 1971 Wild Horse and Burro Act. The Gila horses
are thought to be descendants of Father Kino’s Spanish horses
that he brought to this country in the late 1600s. It is the only
herd to be designated as federally protected since the
implementation of the original Act, coming twenty-eight years
later. The Gila herd was absorbed into the Painted Rock Herd
Management Area where burros were already under management by the
BLM. |
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In 1999, the ISPMB became recipients
of the last of the wild horses on the White Sands Missile Range.
This historic event marked the first time that a privately funded
organization has taken an entire herd of horses to manage as a
wild free-roaming herd. |
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In February of 2000, ISPMB adopted
the last remaining Gila wild horses and placed them in a
conservation program to preserve this rare gene pool. The horses
were eliminated from their rightful lands based on a technicality
of the 1971 Act that allows wild horses to be removed from private
lands. Prior to the protection afforded to the Gila horses, they
were indiscriminately shot by local ranchers. |
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September 2000, ISPMB received its
first grant to build a foundation for the development of the
International Wild Horse & Burro Heritage Center--an
international eco-tourism center. |
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In September 2001, the ISPMB
initiated saving a third wild horse herd. Eighty wild horses from
the Virginia Range near Carson City, Nevada were transported to
the Cheyenne River Reservation in November 2001 where they were
gifted to the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe by ISPMB. The tribe,
known for its conservation efforts, now manages the herd. The
Virginia Range wild horses are unique in that they were the first
herd ever to receive protection in the U.S. |
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October 2003, ISPMB began an Animal
Assisted Therapy program for recovering alcoholics, in conjunction
with the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe’s Four Bands Healing program
bringing healing between ISPMB’s rescue horses and Tribal
clients. |
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In September of 2004, ISPMB accepted
a fourth wild horse herd into its wild horse conservation program.
Eighty-two wild horses from the Catnip herd were sent to ISPMB by
Sheldon Wildlife Range in northern Nevada managed by the US Fish
and Wildlife Service. This agency is not mandated to protect wild
horses and will reduce wild horses on its refuge to 125 animals
and may potentially eliminate all the horses from the refuge. |
