The Missoula County commissioners Tuesday approved new guidelines to help manage horses roaming the Miller Creek area on the south end of Missoula.
The proposal generated hundreds of comments online, and dozens of residents spoke, largely in favor of leaving the horses alone, during two hearings earlier this summer. Some residents have formed the Miller Creek Horse Alliance, which is working to educate people and protect the herd of about 60 to 100 horses.
“We’re happy that the commissioners have worked with us so well, and we’re happy with the resolution as it is,” Bobbie Thompson, with the alliance, said during the meeting.
The resolution establishes a process for private landowners to capture horses that includes a state Department of Livestock inspector and allows placement through nonprofits, private landowners or the state. The landowner must notify the county sheriff, receive authorization before taking action and use humane handling practices.
It also allows the county or its partners, with state approval, to use birth control to help manage the herd size and limit interactions with the public. Chris Lounsbury, the county’s chief administrative officer, said those efforts would be focused on the “incursion” of horses into the residential area of Miller Creek.
“We’re not really talking about the wider-ranging horses that span from the Sapphires down,” he said.
The resolution allows the county to install signs warning drivers of the horses along county roads. The county has been in contact with the Miller Creek Horse Alliance to discuss what the signs will look like, Commissioner Juanita Vero said.
Thompson said more information will come regarding the signs and the group’s other work.
The horses have been in the area since the early 1900s, with about 60 to 100 horses living south of Miller Creek along the Sapphire Mountains, Lounsbury said previously. A group of horses has repeatedly entered the Miller Creek neighborhood, which has become more densely developed over the years, he said. The horses are mostly roaming on private property.
The horses are considered “feral” or “abandoned” rather than “wild” because they are descended from domesticated horses that were turned loose and grew naturally in the area, Lounsbury said. State law puts the county commissioners largely in charge of dealing with feral or abandoned horses, along with the state Department of Livestock, he said.
The horses’ location and status make the situation different from that of wild horses on public lands across the West. The Bureau of Land Management is responsible for wild horses and burros on 25.5 million acres of public land and manages herds through birth control and removing “excess animals” from the range, according to its website.
The goal in Missoula is not to remove horses but to provide a process to manage conflicts, Lounsbury said in June.
Thompson, with the Miller Creek Horse Alliance, said the group is working to become a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization before fundraising or holding formal member meetings. The alliance has several working groups that discuss fundraising, education, signs, responses to horse encounters and other issues, she said.
“It’s a big responsibility,” she said. “There’s a lot that needs to happen, and we’re on it.”
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