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From the Chronicles of the Heber Wild Horse Herd Part 4

11/29/2022

The Designation of the Heber Wild Horse Territory
PUBLIC LAW 92-195-DEC. 15, 1971 649
Public Law 92-195

It is the policy of Congress that wild free-roaming horses and burros shall be protected from capture, branding, harassment, or death; and to accomplish this they are to be considered in the area where presently found, as an integral part of the natural system of the public lands.

Per information from a FOIA request it was discovered that in 1973 W. R. Fallis who was the Assistant Regional Forester, U.S. Forest Service Region 3 requested Inventory Procedures from the Dept of the Interior (BLM) to assist the Forest Service in determining where wild horses were in order to properly designate Wild Horse Territories.

Inventory Procedures:
The Department of the Interior responded with their Inventory Procedures which included the following and much, much more.

Establishment
“It is essential that the maximum geographic limit of the herd be defined”
The use of maps and aerial photos of the inventory area. Collecting data on the ground through the use of the grid technique. Photographs should be taken. It stressed the importance of data. The procedure stated that the “inventory may continue for a period of several years or until an accurate picture of seasonal distribution, territorial limit and forage habits is determined.”

These BLM Inventory Procedures were then sent by Assistant Regional Forester Fallis to Region 3 Forest Supervisors.

But did the Forest Service follow any of the recommendations in order to determine the Heber Wild Horse Territory (HWHT)?

FOIA requests have asked how the Forest Service determined how the 19,700 acres out of the entire Sitgreaves National Forests came to be designated as the Heber Wild Horse Territory. None of the FOIA request responses indicated the Inventory Procedures were followed. There were no photos, no maps indicating where a survey had been done, no survey grids, no data returned in the FOIA responses. In fact, it doesn’t appear there were any procedures for making that determination. Instead the HWHT appears to have been based on the words of a rancher/FS employee who stated there were 7 horses in the forest. With over 800,000 acres and no indication of any wild horse survey, the arbitrary and capricious designation of just under 20,000 acres was made by the Forest Service. The Forest Service is still set on binding the wild horses to those limits. Just lines on a map of a small area that is sliced up with cattle pasture fences and natural terrain.

Post photo is of some of today's Heber wild horses...a herd in peril.

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From the Chronicles of the Heber Wild Horse Herd Part 4

11/29/2022

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“And the wild horses wasn’t hurtin’ nothin’.”
Nevada Rep. Walter Baring introduced a bill in January 1959 to prohibit the use of motorized vehicles to hunt wild horses and burros on public lands. Known as the “Wild Horse Annie Act” the bill passed and became Public Law 86-234 on Sept. 8, 1959. But that bill did little to protect the wild horses and burros from extirpation from our public lands. Their numbers continued to shrink and public outcry for the protection of America’s wild horses and burros was being heard loud and clear by Congress. But the protection of wild horses and burros was not welcomed by everybody. There were still many in positions of power who just wanted them all gone, such was the case in the Sitgreaves.

Animosity towards the wild horses on the part of the Forest Service and ranchers never let up over the years. Prior to the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act being signed into law there was already concern on the part of some of the Forest Service personnel in the Sitgreaves National Forest. In the late 1960s the Sitgreaves Forest Ranger made a deal with local ranchers to capture the horses and remove them from the forest in order to avoid having the forest designated as a wild horse “refuge”. Although many were captured and sold at auction for slaughter with over 800,000 acres in the Sitgreaves and a long history of wild horses throughout, capturing them all was not possible.

The Forest Service and the public lands ranchers always fall back on one of their favorite myths that the horses are not wild because they all came from the White Mountain Apache reservation due to fences being downed. They conveniently fail to mention that a downed fence also allows horses from the forest to cross into the reservation, there are no one way turnstyles. Also important to note is that the Apaches saw the value of the horses that were brought in by the early explorers and settlers and released into the forest which is how they historically acquired horses. Whether on one side of a fence or the other they are of the same ancestors. And most importantly is that the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act defines wild as:
(b) "wild free-roaming horses and burros" means all unbranded and unclaimed horses
and burros on public lands of the United States;

Oral history interview with Doy Reidhead [with transcript], April 3, 2006.
Excerpts:
“So the old ranger that was up there, a great old guy, he just wanted the horses gone. And I’ll tell you why he wanted ’em gone. This might be a.... He was afraid they’d make a wild horse refuge. Now here we’re already gettin’ into some stink. You see what I mean? He said, "If these horses don’t get moved, we’re gonna have trouble with this. They’ll take this and make a wild horse refuge out of it." So he said, "I’ll build the traps, and we’ll [salt?] catch these horses." "All right, that’s fine." "You take ’em to sale and sell ’em, and whatever you get is yours." Lowe: So they were unbranded? Reidhead: Yeah. But they’d give me a bill of sale to ’em. They was unbranded, and on Forest Service land. So we built them traps and [salted?]. We caught 187 horses. I’d unload ’em out of the traps and load ’em in a trailer and haul ’em to sale. A hundred dollars was a big price on ’em.”
Reidhead: Well, in the old days there was no fightin’ fires. Didn’t have nothin’ to fight fires with. My dad tells the story they used to run more wild horses in this country than they do everything put together now. And the wild horses wasn’t hurtin’ nothin’.

Full transcript at:
http://archive.library.nau.edu/.../collection/cpa/id/21163

http://archive.library.nau.edu/.../collection/cpa/id/21163

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From the Chronicles of the Heber Wild Horse Herd Part 3

11/20/2022

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While the history of the Heber Wild Horse Herd is long and rich the history of the Forest Service attempting to destroy the Heber herd is long and sordid.

In 1931 in the Sitgreaves National Forest in Navajo County, AZ the Forest Service had a policy of “ridding the range of wild horses” by having the FS Rangers shoot them. Back then, as is the case today, “ridding the range of wild horses” was all to benefit the public lands ranchers. However, a problem arose when domestic horses that were grazing the forest were also being shot. This resulted in a Federal Court Case which in the end sided with the Forest Service and allowed their policy of shooting of wild horses to continue as long as an effort was made to determine if the horses were wild or domestic.
The following is an excerpt of the Memorandum that was issued by Quincy Randles, Acting Regional Forester.

G-Trespass
Wild Horses No. 20-G-3 Albuquerque, New Mexico
April 22, 1931
Memorandum for Forest Officers:
Excerpt:
From the information in the decree and injunction, it is evident that in carrying out closing order procedure, the courts will insist that ample notice of the plans for disposing of the wild horses, including the period fixed by the Forest Supervisor for disposing of them, be given to the interested stockmen; also, that before shooting horses, Forest officers use reasonable diligence in determining whether the horses are wild or gentle. It is realized that where wild and gentle horses are mixed on the same range it is rather difficult to distinguish the gentle horses from the wild ones, consequently a gentle horse may be killed accidentally, in which case the Service would be criticized, but if reasonable diligence is used to determine whether the horse is wild or gentle and notice of the time set for shooting the wild horses is given to the local stockmen, it is felt that the closing order procedure will be supported by the Federal courts and by public sentiment.
/s/ Quincy Randles, Acting Regional Forester.

From the resulting Federal Court Order:

The Complainant, through its officers, is authorized to dispose of, by shooting if necessary, any wild horse of unknown ownership, as herein defined, whether branded or not, found in trespass on the National Forest running at large on the forest after said range has been closed by the Secretary of Agriculture to the grazing of wild horses of unknown ownership as herein defined and reasonable notice has been given thereof.
Hereof fail not, under penalty of the law thence ensuing. WITNESS, the Honorable F. C. Jacobs, Judge of the District Court of the United States for the District of Arizona and the seal of said Court hereunto affixed at Phoenix this 9th day of April, A.D. 1931.
The Memorandum and along with the Federal Court Order
http://npshistory.com/.../region/3/early-days/2/sec3.htm

As we watch the Heber wild horses living free it’s important to reflect back in history to their ancestors and the abuse they underwent. Today’s horses are still in the crosshairs of the Forest Service. We are currently watching the death of the Alpine wild horse herd at the hands of the Forest Service. They no longer shoot horses, though they do have a loophole for that option, they are using different weapons to eliminate the herds. After the initial culls the Heber herd will be kept in a nonviable state through the heavy use of birth control on the mares ensuring that man, not nature will select which mares breed. That is not the definition of wild.

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From the Chronicles of the Heber Wild Horse Herd Part 2

11/20/2022

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The Past Teaches Us About the Present
Because history gives us the tools to analyze and explain problems in the past, it positions us to see patterns that might otherwise be invisible in the present – thus providing a crucial perspective for understanding (and solving!) current and future problems.
https://history.wisc.edu/.../history-careers/why-history/....

Timeline of the History of the Apache Sitgreaves
Wild Horses (ASNF)

Prehistoric era: Ancestor of the horse roams North America
Circa 30,000 BC: Ancestor of horse migrates to Eurasia, is domesticated and ultimately traded to European countries including Spain.

Circa 20,000 BC: Prehistoric cave drawings dated circa 20,000 BC on the Spanish Iberian Peninsula show that wild horses have roamed the Spanish Iberian Peninsula for thousands of years. Some of these horses are domesticated and selectively, bred to become the modern Andalusian. At about the same time, the wild Sorrai horse evolves in Spain with its characteristic buckskin color, dun line, black mane and tail, and black markings on the legs. Some of the Sorrai horses are domesticated and incorporated into Spanish horse bloodlines.

Circa 700-800 AD: The African Barb comes to Spain during the invasion of the Berbers and is bred with Spanish stock to become the Spanish Barb.

1540 – Francisco Coronado and his expedition to the Seven Cities of Gold travel over the Mogollon Rim near Pinetop, McNary, Vernon and St. Johns bringing scores of Spanish horses including Barbs and Andalusians. Horses are allowed to forage in some areas of the Rim and Apache Sitgreaves National Forests. Coronado Expedition marks the re-introduction of the horse to the West and to North America including in Apache Sitgreaves National Forests. Muster roles and ships logs note numbers of horses and colors of horses including black, chestnut, bay, and buckskin, colors of many of the wild Apache Sitgreaves horses today.
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1653 - Father Eusebio Kino makes an apostolic expedition to the Mogollon Rim and Apache Sitgreaves National Forests “to the borders of the land of the Apacheria.” Father Kino, an ultimate horseman, brings Andalusians, Barbs and Jennets from Spain to Mexico where they are kept at his Mission Dolores. The horses are used on the 1653 expedition as mounts for Father Kino and Spanish soldiers who accompany him. Scores more are herded as remounts and some left in areas of good forage on the Rim and in Apache Sitgreaves Forests to breed as more remounts on the trip back.

1870’s - General George Crook brings mounted cavalrymen to the Mogollon Rim and Apache Sitgreaves National Forests near the Coronado Trail and Crook’s Trail is established. Some of the mounts likely run and breed with the wild Spanish horses already established in Apache Sitgreaves by the Coronado and Kino expeditions.

The Photos:
Although the horses had been in the Sitgreaves all along they became much more visible in areas where the human caused 2002 Rodeo-Chediski fire raged through leaving open spaces where trees and shrubs had once offered cover to the wildlife.
The bottom photo is of the iconic band stallion “Old Buck” along with his lead mare “Sweet Suzanna” and their two youngsters.

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From the Chronicles of the Heber Wild Horse Herd Part 1

11/19/2022

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Part 1
In 2005 the Forest Service would have eliminated the Heber wild horse herd had it not been for those who fought to keep them free in the forest. Due to their efforts in 2007 a Federal Court Judge determined no free-roaming horses could be removed from the Sitgreaves until the Forest Service developed a Heber Wild Horse Territory management plan. Many years ago the original timeline composed by the people who fought to save the horses passed their information to our group and we have been adding to it ever since. Although not all of us were a part of the original group that saved them we were well aware of the Heber horses during that stressful time. We heard their thundering hooves, we watched them, photographed them, and documented them for our own sake.

Over time we would like to share some of the history of the Heber wild horse herd as they once again teeter on the brink of destruction.

Arizona’s very own living symbols of our rich American history
As he crossed Black River at Big Bonita Creek and approached a meadow where Francisco Coronado had camped in 1540 near a trail used in the 1870s by U.S. Cavalry General George Crook and his troops, Arizonan and former Secretary of the Interior Stewart Udall said, “I am reminded of the extent to which, for many centuries, horses played a major role. This very forest has been the scene of a dramatic pageant of military horsemanship. If we had a time machine to go back, we would have watched young Spaniards, in the summer of 1540, astride the first European horses ever to stomp the ground in what is now the American West (Arizona Highways, April 1984).” Many experts agree that the first true ancestor of the Apache Sitgreaves National Forests (ASNF) wild horses roamed North America during the prehistoric era and then migrated to Eurasia where they evolved into the modern horse as we know them, were domesticated and spread throughout Europe including to Spain.

Historical documents provide much evidence that some of the ASNF wild horses are ancestors of the first horses reintroduced in North America by Francisco Coronado in 1540. In his search for the seven cities of gold Coronado spent much time on the Mogollon Rim and in ASNF. He brought with him scores of mounts. Servants drove more horses to be used as remounts. When they camped, the horses were allowed to graze and run in the meadows of ASNF. In 1653, the letters, maps and diary of Father Eusebio Kino demonstrate that he brought more horses to the Rim, on an apostolic exploration to possibly expand his ministry. Later, General George Crook brought mounted soldiers to the region using a trail close to the Coronado trail. The wild horses of ASNF have a rich history of military equitation.

Photo of Heber wild horses from the original timeline composed by people who were instrumental in saving them. Without their efforts most of the people who visit and photograph the Hebers today would never have known the Heber herd ever existed. The question today is will the Heber wild horse herd be around for future generations?

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From the Chronicles of the Heber Wild Horse Herd Part 4

From the Chronicles of the Heber Wild Horse Herd Part 4

From the Chronicles of the Heber Wild Horse Herd Part 3

From the Chronicles of the Heber Wild Horse Herd Part 2

From the Chronicles of the Heber Wild Horse Herd Part 1

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