Wild horses in western Utah are being driven off their home range by helicopter this month. Since October 2, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has captured 196 horses from the Sulphur Herd Management Area, and 39 of them are foals. Not one has been released back to the range. The agency plans to remove roughly 300 horses in total.

The roundup has already cost lives. The BLM reported two mares died on October 4. One, a nine-year-old grulla mare, had a broken front leg. The other, a 17-year-old brown mare, was lame with a swollen knee, and the agency said she had no hope of recovering.

The Sulphur herd lives on nearly 266,000 acres of public land, and some of these horses carry traits tied to Colonial Spanish horses, a living link to the story of the American West. Captured horses are being trucked to a holding facility near Delta, Utah, to wait for adoption or sale. Advocates worry that family bands are being split apart along the way, and that the long-term future of these horses is uncertain.

The BLM says the removal is needed because water and forage on the range are limited. Wild horse advocates argue there are humane, science-based ways to manage herd size that keep horses on public land instead of in pens. “Wild and free is where they belong,” according to American Wild Horse Conservation.

The BLM has the power to call off the rest of this roundup. Each horse taken loses its freedom, and each foal may lose its family. Sign the petition to tell the Bureau of Land Management to halt the Sulphur roundup now, before more horses are hurt or lost.