Letters to the Editor Feb. 6

No proof that wild horses damage rangeland

The article Jan. 30, "26 wild horses dead in roundup," should read "46 horses dead." Most of the horses give birth in the spring, so the 20 spontaneous abortions are technically of foals who weren't quite old enough to make it.

Those deaths occurred in direct correlation to the roundups. The areas these horses are being rounded up in are grasslands where there is available water.

Horses are native to Nevada. The reason they probably disappeared from the landscape is because people arrived here - the timing was the same. So, then people brought them back. I often suggest that people go down and look at the 26,000-year-old horse skeleton at the Nevada State Museum that was found in Washoe County - that animal would have been fairly indistinguishable from the horses out there today.

The confusion lies in the fact that scientists who lacked the sophisticated testing available today focused really hard on minor skeletal differences and would give them different species names. That is a lot like early scientific attempts to assign different species to different races of human beings.

The truth is, there is no quantifiable data specifically related to wild horse damage to the range in the area in which these roundups are occurring. And then, of course, damage has to be defined. Prairie dogs were once considered damaging to the environment of the Great Plains, now it turns out they are part of the ecosystem after all.

Dorothy Nylen

Dayton

You killed Yucca Mountain ... now what?

Mr. President: Concerning your decision to cease funding for Yucca Mountain, don't you think it would be prudent to have a Plan B before killing Plan A?

Russel J. Reaver

Carson City

Why is Arizona processing Nevada's state business?

I read today that 300 Nevada state workers may have to be laid off. I have a suggestion. Stop sending Nevada sales tax money to Phoenix, Ariz., for processing.

I own the Genoa Bar, and every month, I send your sales tax money out of state. It sure seems like some Nevada folks could use those accounting jobs we currently outsource to Phoenix. I'm sure that someone has figured it's a little cheaper to let the Phoenix processors do it. But I bet if you added into the equation the jobs that would be created for Nevadans, it would be a different bottom line. It would mean less people on unemployment.

I keep hearing, "Where are the jobs?" Well, apparently they're in Arizona, paid for with Nevada tax dollars.

Willy Webb

Gardnerville