Wyoming Wild Horse Roundup of 3,300 Animals Delayed Until October

Attorneys for the Bureau of Land Management confirmed the roundup scheduled to begin October 13, 2025, has been cancelled, halting what would have been one of the largest wild horse removals in Wyoming history. A showdown in the high desert over more than 3,000 free-roaming horses on 2.1 million acres of southwest Wyoming's checkerboard region won't happen for at least six more months, federal attorneys said.

The planned operation targeted three historic wild horse herds in Wyoming's checkerboard region: the Salt Wells Creek herd, the Great Divide Basin herd, and the Rock Springs portion of the Adobe Town herd. The checkerboard takes its name from alternating 1-mile blocks of private and public land set up in the 1800s. In 2010, the Rock Springs Grazing Association revoked consent for the free-roaming horses to exist on its property within the 40-mile-wide swath of southern Wyoming where that interchanging public-private land forms the checkerboard pattern. The dispute has dragged through courts and agency offices for 15 years since.

The legal foundation for the planned removals is now in serious question. In July 2025, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the American Wild Horse Conservation, the Animal Welfare Institute, and other plaintiffs, holding that the BLM ignored its statutory duty to base decisions on whether these lands could sustain a thriving natural ecological balance. The court faulted BLM for not explaining how removing all horses from public sections of the checkerboard would maintain that "thriving natural ecological balance," a requirement of the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act. A District Court judge must now determine an appropriate remedy for the BLM's violation of the law, or whether the plan amendment should be vacated entirely.

Despite that ruling, BLM moved to schedule the October 13 roundup anyway, triggering a new wave of litigation. The coalition's lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Wyoming, necessitated by BLM's announcement that it would begin roundups to eliminate these herds on October 13, in defiance of the federal appellate court ruling. That coalition suit was the second filed in less than a week, coming shortly after Friends of Animals separately sued to block the operation.

Federal attorneys then filed a joint motion requesting the U.S. District Court for Wyoming pause the legal proceedings until at least May 10. U.S. District Judge Kelly Rankin granted the request. BLM officials said they did not anticipate attempting the removal until at least the end of the federal fiscal year, September 30. Return to Freedom, one of the advocacy groups whose earlier appeal produced the 10th Circuit victory, reported BLM confirmed the delay extends until at least next summer.

BLM-Wyoming spokesman Micky Fisher cited several reasons why the agency was not attempting to execute the whole-herd removal plans before October. "We generally want to make sure the funding is in line in order to move forward," Fisher said. "That's really the bottom line." Staffing was also a concern, he said, and BLM needed to be on sound legal footing before proceeding.

Even as the checkerboard roundup stalled, BLM proceeded with a separate operation nearby. The agency carried out a roundup in July and August on another portion of the Adobe Town Herd Management Area, where 1,676 wild horses and one mule were captured and eight horses killed. That roundup went forward because it relied on a different Determination of National Environmental Policy Act Adequacy than the RMP amendment underpinning the planned mass removals.

Jennifer Best, wildlife law program director for Friends of Animals, said her organization was relieved but not reassured. "We're certainly glad that the horses aren't in immediate danger of being rounded up and removed," Best said. "We're kind of in a waiting pattern with BLM right now to see what they will do." She was direct about what another attempt to eliminate all three herds would mean legally: "We believe that wiping them out from all the public lands is illegal. We remain committed to challenging any decision, short of allowing these wild horses to stay on public lands."

Attorney Bill Eubanks, who represents horse advocacy groups and has been involved in the litigation for 15 years, said it is unlikely BLM will back off its long-held plans to eliminate the checkerboard herds. "I guess anything is possible. I don't see it," Eubanks said. "BLM has never once proposed a situation that would keep horses out there. They have done everything in their power to try to get horses gone, gone, gone. It would take a big change of heart."

A status conference is scheduled for October 7, where further details of the proceedings are expected to be defined. What emerges from that hearing will shape whether roughly 3,300 animals remain on Wyoming's high desert or are permanently removed from public lands they have roamed for generations.