In a baffling rationale, the National Park Service is willing to let endangered species be trampled by feral horses at Cumberland Island National Seashore because it doesn't see itself liable for what horses do.
The fate of feral horses at Cumberland Island National Seashore is in the hands of a federal judge who must decide whether the National Park Service's hands-off approach to the horses and their impacts is justified.
In a coastal landscape of Spanish moss-draped live oaks, salt marshes, and white sand beaches, a land that offers nesting habitat for loggerhead sea turtles, is crawling with armadillos, and feeds Red knots, a threatened bird species, and wood storks, horses are incongruous with the setting.
Cumberland Island National Seashore's feral horses not only are damaging the seashore's environment and two federally protected species but are not being humanely managed by the National Park Service and should be removed from the seashore, according to a lawsuit filed against the federal government.