This case challenges a Bureau of Land Management (BLM) decision to roundup and remove nearly all of the wild free-roaming horses within three horse areas in northeastern Nevada.  BLM claims that it needs to remove these horses because they are overgrazing the public lands, although BLM's own documents show that cows - and not wild horses - are causing the degradation of public lands. 

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Appeal, Statement of Reasons and Petition for Stay

The 70,000-acre Nickel Creek allotment has the most riparian habitat of any allotment in BLM's Owyhee Resource Area of southwestern Idaho.  BLM's 1997 grazing permit for the Nickel Creek allotment was held unlawful in the IWP v. Hahn litigation.  BLM determined in 2001 that grazing was violating all applicable rangeland health standards -- yet under pressure from the permittees, BLM issued a new 2003 permit that continued excessive livestock numbers.

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Nickel Creek ALJ decision

This large case challenges several hundred grazing permits, oil and gas leases, and other land management decisions approved by BLM during the last years of the Bush Administration, which individually and together harm the Great Basin core population of greater sage-grouse in Idaho and Nevada.

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Great Basin sage grouse complaint

Brief opposing BLM's motion to dismiss

This long-standing litigation challenges BLM’s mismanagement of grazing in the Jarbidge Resource Area of southern Idaho, which has harmed sage-grouse, pygmy rabbits, and other sensitive sagebrush-obligate species and their habitats. Our first court victory, in 2004, held that BLM violated NEPA in approving "temporary" grazing increases sought by Simplot Co. and other major corporate ranchers. In 2005, the court held that BLM violated NEPA and FLPMA in approving long-term grazing increases despite a sharp decline in Jarbidge sage-grouse populations.

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2005 decision

February 2009 decision

Challenge to BLM’s 2006 grazing regulations as violating the National Environmental Policy Act, Endangered Species Act, and other federal laws. BLM adopted the 2006 regulations to give the livestock industry more ownership and control over public lands resources, while excluding the public from grazing permit decisions and weakening ecological requirements to prevent overgrazing on 160 million acres across the West.

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June 2007 decision