Wild Horses

The gig: As chairman of News Corp.'s 20th Century Fox Television, Dana Walden, 46, oversees one of the most prolific production companies in town. The studio makes 33 shows, including the hits "Glee," "Modern Family" and "How I Met Your Mother. " Walden shares her title with Gary Newman. The two have run the TV operation for 12 years, and their partnership has outlasted many actual Hollywood marriages. Early riser: A Los Angeles native, Walden was obsessed with television from an early age. "On Saturdays, I would wake up at 5 o'clock in the morning to start watching cartoons.

During the last ice age, 25,000 years ago, a man — or woman — painted spotted horses on the walls of caves at what is now Pech Merle, France. Scholars still argue about why. Did this prehistoric Picasso paint in order to faithfully depict his surroundings? Or did he work for some other purpose, perhaps creative or religious? Did spotty horses even exist back then? Until now, researchers had generally thought that wild horses of the period were solid black or bay. Now a new genetic analysis shows otherwise — suggesting that the ancient painter was taking little artistic license.

A controversial roundup of 2,500 wild horses from public and private lands in Nevada began on Monday amid protests from activists who call it needless and inhumane. Contractors in helicopters and on horseback herded some of the mustangs into corrals in the Black Rock Range, a chain of mountains 100 miles north of Reno, according to a spokeswoman for the Bureau of Land Management. Heather Emmons said she did not know how many horses were captured on the first day of the roundup, which will take two months and stretch across 1,750 square miles in the Calico Mountains Complex.

The gig: As chairman of News Corp.'s 20th Century Fox Television, Dana Walden, 46, oversees one of the most prolific production companies in town. The studio makes 33 shows, including the hits "Glee," "Modern Family" and "How I Met Your Mother. " Walden shares her title with Gary Newman. The two have run the TV operation for 12 years, and their partnership has outlasted many actual Hollywood marriages. Early riser: A Los Angeles native, Walden was obsessed with television from an early age. "On Saturdays, I would wake up at 5 o'clock in the morning to start watching cartoons.

U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar's ode to the "majestic" wild horse, and his description of how the federal government must manage its population in his Jan. 14 Times Op-Ed article, comes across to the average reader as a reasonable and sympathetic approach to the problems faced by the American mustang. What Salazar doesn't mention is that the bureaucracies now under his control -- and the business interests they service -- have created the problems the Interior secretary says he wants to solve.

We, the taxpayers, are paying $9.3 million a year to feed and maintain wild horses in California. Yet we must pay $125 for these horses if we are to adopt one. The horses that aren't purchased are "euthanized." There are probably hundreds of organizations that these horses can be donated to such as summer camps for children. Also, the camps for handicapped children would certainly appreciate these animals. There are also many farmers, Indian reservations, I could go on. Many people would love to have these wild horses but cannot afford to pay for something that they are already paying for. Horses are beautiful animals that should not be sentenced to death!

Thousands of mustangs that roam the West would be moved to preserves in the Midwest and East to protect the wild horses and the rangelands that support them, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said Wednesday. The plan would not require killing any wild horses, he said. Interior Department officials had warned in recent months that slaughtering some wild horses and burros might be necessary to combat the rising cost of maintaining them. "We have a huge problem -- out-of-control populations of wild horses and burros on our public lands," Salazar said in a conference call with reporters.

Slaughtering wild horses for food isn't a viable option for thinning herds that have strained public lands throughout the West, the federal Bureau of Land Management director told supporters of horse processing plants Tuesday. Instead, the agency plans to give mares birth control in hopes of diminishing the need for controversial horse roundups, Bob Abbey said at the Summit of the Horse conference in Las Vegas. The BLM, he said, also will continue promoting adoption and seeking locations to place captured horses other than its holding pens.

Nine wild horses taken from federal lands for adoption in Topeka had to be destroyed after they were injured when a truck carrying them overturned near Guymon, Okla., authorities said. The truck, which was carrying 47 horses, overturned Wednesday night while rounding a curve, an Oklahoma Highway Patrol official said.

Federal officials are considering euthanizing wild horses to deal with the growing population on the range and in holding pens, authorities said. Wild horses have overpopulated public lands and the U.S. Bureau of Land Management can't afford to care for the mustangs that have been rounded up, Henri Bisson, the agency's deputy director, said in Reno. Also, fewer people are adopting the horses, he said. The agency is also considering whether to stop roundups to save money. There are an estimated 33,000 wild horses on the range in 10 Western states, Bisson said, and 27,000 is the maximum the agency can handle.

Crawling out of their tent, Jake Crawford and Rollie Adler gasped when they saw the kaleidoscope sky of the Nevada high desert at dawn. The boys had set camp at dusk, both too exhausted to see past their noses. The boys went to bed sore and with good reason. Before dimming the lantern, Jake had turned to Rollie, "Buddy, we sure earned our rest today. " Rollie yawned, "That was quite a chase, Jake. " They had done it. They had tracked and found Two Pennies. No one in Mesquite believed they could do it. "You got a better chance of catching a cold than of catching that stallion!"

In a rare, freewheeling marathon of proposed spending cuts, GOP leaders in the House threw open the doors to the federal budget, and lawmakers careened from debates on fighter jet engines to wild horses as they tried to bore through an expanding mound of amendments that had grown to 600. By Friday, the Republican drive to cut more than $61 billion this year will have spanned the federal government's domestic reach, including environmental protection,...

Slaughtering wild horses for food isn't a viable option for thinning herds that have strained public lands throughout the West, the federal Bureau of Land Management director told supporters of horse processing plants Tuesday. Instead, the agency plans to give mares birth control in hopes of diminishing the need for controversial horse roundups, Bob Abbey said at the Summit of the Horse conference in Las Vegas. The BLM, he said, also will continue promoting adoption and seeking locations to place captured horses other than its holding pens.

SHINGLETOWN, CALIF. Wild Horse Sanctuary Open House When, where: Aug. 21, Wild Horse Sanctuary Highlights: This annual Shasta County event, hosted by a nonprofit, includes opportunities to ride horses (free for children 10 and younger), see wild mustangs and burros and learn about horseshoeing, grooming and saddling. Also cowboy poetry, live music, a barn dance and plenty of food. Cost: Free Info: (530) 474-5770, http://www.wildhorsesanctuary.

Sweet Cicely wasn't living up to her name this weekend. Standoffish and a little irritated, she tossed her black mane and paid no attention to the petite woman who had entered her metal pen. After several failed attempts to earn Cicely's respect, Sibylle Westbrook again timidly stepped toward the 900-pound mustang. "Get bigger, not closer," instructor Donna Maye West called out gently. "Tell her, 'I need you to give me some space.' She's messing with you." After a few more attempts, Westbrook, 43, managed to persuade Cicely to walk forward and conduct several inside turns.

U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar's ode to the "majestic" wild horse, and his description of how the federal government must manage its population in his Jan. 14 Times Op-Ed article, comes across to the average reader as a reasonable and sympathetic approach to the problems faced by the American mustang. What Salazar doesn't mention is that the bureaucracies now under his control -- and the business interests they service -- have created the problems the Interior secretary says he wants to solve.

Santa Barbara County Animal Services officials are monitoring the daily feeding of more than 450 wild horses being kept on a Buellton ranch after receiving reports that some of the animals were undernourished. The checks began two weeks ago after complaints from neighbors and veterinarians that rancher Slick Gardner was mistreating animals under his care. The Dreamcatcher Wild Horse and Burro Sanctuary placed 127 wild horses on Gardner's ranch.

Since Spanish conquistadors brought horses to the American continent four centuries ago, the majestic animals that once roamed wild on our nation's great prairies have endured dramatic changes in the American landscape. The grasslands of the Midwest gave way to farms. Barbed-wire fences closed the ranges of Texas. Western cities grew and suburbs sprawled. Having lost much of their range, wild horses teetered on the verge of disappearing in the 1960s, prompting Congress to pass the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971, which established new federal protections for the animals.

CALIFORNIA Horse haven My sister and I enjoyed an overnight horse camping trip with the Wild Horse Sanctuary (in Northern California). The best part: seeing herds of wild mustangs. Wild Horse Sanctuary, 5796 Wilson Hill Road, Shingleton; (530) 335-2241, www.wild. Two-day trail rides, $435. -- Debbie Fawcett, Seal Beach