Mustang Horse

These horses are wild mustang’s (actually Maroons) found in Northern America. The word mustang comes from the Spanish word ‘mesteno’. The mustang horses are direct descendants of horses brought to America by the Spanish from the sixteenth century Andalusian breed.

This explains why the European settlers after the Spaniards, were some Indian tribes and the horse did not exist in America at the time that this was discovered by the Spaniards. (Although the ancestor of the horse comes from the continent, ending after the continental drift).

Americans and the vast plains by the absence of natural predators contributed to its rapid expansion. In fact, a mustang herd can double in size every five years. They have been highly appreciated by Aboriginal people for being pioneers with great resistance and strength, a product of enormous muscular development.

In the early twentieth century the mustang reached the 2 million mark. It became a problem for farmers, and competed with their cattle for grazing.

Their number gradually fell until by the end of the 60s there were 320,000 animals left. Given the rapid decline in the number, in 1971 the U.S. Congress passed a law declaring the mustang a protected species.