10-11-2011

Two Texas park rangers stood at the edge of a canyon with sniper rifles to shoot wild burros, small donkeys that live in the state's deserts. The rangers shot 71 burros over several months, often wounding the animals without a "kill shot," leaving them to slowly die.
Now it's open season on burros for Texas rangers. According to people helping the burros, Texas is actually killing wild burros to make way for hunting opportunities for wealthy hunters. Those hunters have plans with the state to release bighorn sheep into the park -- a prized animal for which hunters have paid up to $150,000 for the privilege to hunt.
Karen Luce is an activist working with the Wild Burro Protection League. She started a petition on Change.org asking Governor Rick Perry to end Texas's cruel extermination policy for wild burros. Click here to add your name to her petition.
Burros have lived in and around Texas's Big Bend Ranch State Park for hundreds of years, and there's no evidence the burros bother anybody or anything in the park.
Rick Perry's state parks department is allowing a "shoot-on-sight" policy for wild burros, even from a helicopter. With fewer than 300 wild burros left in Texas's Big Bend Ranch State Park, there's little time to stop the state's extermination of these gentle animals.
Karen wants to expose Rick Perry -- a Republican presidential candidate trying to build popularity nationwide -- for prioritizing wealthy hunters over protected animals in state parks. If enough people speak out, Perry can be forced to stop Texas's extermination policy for wild burros. Please sign the petition to stop the slaughter of wild burros in Texas's Big Bend Ranch State Park:
http://www.change.org/petitions/texas-stop-killing-wild-burros
Thanks for being a change-maker,
- Michael and the Change.org team