Lime: From One Mustang to Another
by Lime Planet, New York, New York on 04. 7.06
Ford, longtime maker of Mustang sports cars, has taken an interest in another kind of mustang: the wild ones. The company raised more than $200,000 to help save wild horses from the slaughterhouse, where many of them could end up as a result of federal policies. The money will go to animal rescue groups to buy the horses and provide for their long-term care.
Though wild horses have long been a symbol of the rugged, independent spirit of the American West, the symbol is relatively hollow. Herds of the horses, which roam on BLM lands across the West, are actively managed by federal agencies. Each year, the BLM rounds up the horses to control their numbers, taking many away for sale or adoption. Some end up in the slaugherhouse, sent abroad as meat.
Ford's contributions will go to a BLM fund that will distribute the money to organizations that agree to care for the horses. Donations can be made online at www.savethemustangs.org. For more information on adopting a formerly wild horse or burro, visit the BLM's wild horse web site.
The numbers of wild horses have been slashed from more than two million a century ago to only around 25,000 today.
[by Hillary Rosner , Syndicated from the Planet section of LIME ]
So I have to wonder: how green is saving the wild mustang?
On the one hand, the reason for their demise is people encroaching on wild lands, which is bad. Slaughtering nobel horses for strip malls is certainly bad press.
On the other hand, horses are not native to this continent. I believe pigs are doing horrible things to Hawaii, and there's the isue with bunnies in Australia. All sorts of plant species get demolished b these sort of invasions (see NATURE OUT OF PLACE).
I'm not advocating removal of wild ohorses, BTW just sirring up the pot. When does an invsive species become a colonized stakeholder?
" I'm not advocating removal of wild ohorses, BTW just sirring up the pot. When does an invsive species become a colonized stakeholder? "
If you are not advocating the removal of wild horses from the U.S., you are at least encouraging a discussion on removing them.
I know of no studies showing that wild horses are a detrement to wild lands in North America (not that such studies may have been conducted).
However, I can not see how a wild horses activities could be any more distructive than a wild bufflo.
" On the other hand, horses are not native to this continent. "
Actually they are, you just need to broaden your timeline. Wild horses did exist in North America several thousand years ago.
In recient times of course, they were introduced by the Spanish in the 1600s.
Therefore, if the people stay (Non-Native Americans, which are destructive to the environment overall), then why should the horses which are not destructive and which were native here thousands of years ago and have been native more reciently for 400 years not be allowed to stay?