House panel approves bill to ban slaughter of wild horses

A key House panel approved legislation Wednesday that would bar federal officials from slaughtering healthy wild horses and burros. Bureau of Land Management officials have raised the possibility of killing as many as 30,000 wild mustangs they can no longer afford to house in holding facilities after removing them from land that cannot sustain the growing herds. But Democratic leaders of the House Natural Resources Committee said sterilization of herd members and an expanded adoption program are more humane options. The bill by committee Chairman Nick Rahall, D-W.Va., and Rep. Raul Grijalva, D-Ariz., would step up fertility control measures, encourage more adoptions of the animals and provide the more than 60,000 wild horses and burros under federal control with as much as 19 million additional acres on which to roam freely. The bill would allow the federal government to buy and exchange land and enter into cooperative agreements with private groups that want to establish wild-horse sanctuaries on private land. Grijalva said the bill provides for federal officials to preserve the health of the entire ecosystem, not just the horses...Gannett