The management of free-roaming horses and burros on US public lands involves welfare tensions between population control and humane treatment.
Wild horse and burro management in the US involves genuine welfare tensions. Helicopter roundups — where horses are chased by aircraft into corrals — cause severe acute stress, injuries from running on unfamiliar terrain, and trauma from capture. The long-term holding system maintains tens of thousands of horses in feedlot-like conditions with inadequate social housing and limited behavioral expression. Fertility control through aerial dart delivery of PZP vaccine offers an alternative that maintains horses on the range while slowing population growth, but requires sustained funding and political commitment. The welfare-optimal solution combines contraceptive management, humane roundups where necessary, and adoption programs that expand the market for wild horses as working animals.