General Distribution
For the purpose of this report, feral horses are referred to as wild horses. However, all living horses in
North America are descended from domestic horse populations. True wild horses are presumed to be
extinct in North America and throughout their historic range (Bennett and Hoffmann 1999).
A wild horse population occurs in the interior valleys of the La Panza Range on the Los Padres National
Forest (Stephenson and Calcarone 1999). This population is referred to as the Black Mountain herd and
is located east of the town of Santa Margarita. The management area comprises 13,125 acres (5,311
hectares) of public lands and 635 acres (257 hectares) of privately owned lands managed by the Santa
Lucia District of the Los Padres National Forest. The USDA Forest Service conducted an inventory of
wild horses in the Black Mountain management area in 2001, at which time the herd consisted of 23
horses (Fountain pers. comm.). In October 2001, 11 of these horses were removed from the herd and
transferred to a Bureau of Land Management adoption facility. Systematics
Evolution of the horse began in North America more than 55 million years ago. The genus Equus
evolved during the Pliocene period circa 4 million years ago. E. simplicidens was the first single-toed
(hoofed) horse known to occur in North America and was directly ancestral to the horses that traveled
across the Bering Land Bridge into Asia circa 2.5 million years ago. The horse is believed to have died
out in North America by the early Holocene, 11,400 years ago. Domestication and extirpation of wild
horses (E. caballus) in Europe and Asia began circa 6,000 years ago. The last living form of wild horse
is considered to be the subspecies E. c. przewalskii in Mongolia, China. The last E. c. przewalskii was
captured and placed into a zoo in 1947. All subspecies of E. caballus are presently believed to be
extinct in the wild. The Spanish reintroduced Natural History domestic horses to North America in the
early 1500s (Bennett and Hoffmann 1999). Habitat Requirements
Wild horse is a generalist species and inhabits a variety of habitats and vegetative communities
(Pogacnik 1994), from semi-desert to steppe-tundra (Bennett and Hoffmann 1999). Wild horses
typically prefer cooler, moist habitats of open forests and grasslands (Bennett and Hoffmann 1999,
Stephenson and Calcarone 1999). Reproduction
Female wild horses can successfully breed by the age of 4; males are usually not fertile until their sixth
year. Domestic male horses are capable of breeding at any time of the year but show a strong peak in
sex drive from April to June. The average gestation period is 335 days but ranges between 287 and 419
days for wild, feral, and domestic horses. In the northern hemisphere, females usually give birth to a
single young from March to April, just before the new rut (Bennett and Hoffmann 1999). Daily/Seasonal Activity
Wild horses live in year-round groups or herds. A herd structure includes a dominant (alpha) male, five
or six unrelated females, several young of different ages, and groups of bachelor or solitary males. The
dominant female is generally responsible for leading the herd to grazing areas, water holes, and shelter.
When traveling, the stallion will usually remain in the rear of the herd to protect the group from attack
by predators and from other males (Bennett and Hoffmann 1999). Diet and Foraging
Wild horses are herbivorous, eating a variety of herbaceous vegetation. Within most herd management
areas, wild horses graze with domestic livestock and other native wildlife species (Pogacnik 1994).
Members of the herd feed according to their position in the herd hierarchy (Bennett and Hoffmann
1999). Territoriality/Home Range
The home range of wild horses at the Black Mountain Management Area is restricted by the limited
amount of suitable habitat (Stephenson and Calcarone 1999). The management area encompasses a total
of 13,850 acres (5,605 hectares) of publicly and privately owned land (Fountain pers. comm.). Predator-Prey Relations
Wild horses have very few predators. In North America, major predators of feral horses are wolves,
coyotes, and mountain lions (Bennett and Hoffmann 1999). Literature Cited
Bennett, D.; Hoffmann, R.S. 1999. Equus caballus. Mammalian Species 628: 1-14.
Bureau of Land Management (Ed.). 2000. National wild horse and burro program. [Online]. Available:
http://www.blm.gov/offline/.
Bureau of Land Management (Ed.). 2002. Public Land Statistics 2002. [Homepage of Bureau of Land
Management], [Online]. Available: http://www.blm.gov/natacq/pls02/.
Pogacnik, T. (Ed.). 1994. Wild horses and burrows on public lands. [Homepage of Bureau of Land
Management], [Online]. Available: http://www.biology.usgs.gov/s+t/noframe/x182.htm.
Stephenson, J.R.; Calcarone, G.M. 1999. Southern California mountains and foothills assessment:
Habitat and species conservation issues. General Technical Report GTR-PSW-172. Albany, CA: Pacific
Southwest Research Station, Forest Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Information gathered from California DFG - California Interagency Wildlife Task Group
