Nokota horse

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The Nokota horse is a distinct type of horse that once ran wild in the Little Missouri Badlands, located in Southwestern North Dakota. Non-Indian people first encountered wild horses in the area during the late nineteenth century, when the range cattle industry expanded northward. During the open range era, domestic horses were turned loose to breed in range bands, and some no doubt contributed to wild herds. Theodore Roosevelt, who ranched in the Little Missouri area between 1883 and 1886, wrote:

"In a great many, indeed in most localities, there are wild horses to be found, which, although invariably of domestic descent, being either themselves runaways from some ranch or Indian outfit, or else claiming such for their sires and dams, yet are quite as wild as the antelope on whose domain they have intruded."

Throughout the early twentieth century, bands of wild horses continued to run throughout the rugged badlands area. Local ranchers often rounded them up, for both sport and profit. Following the drought and depression of the 1930s, federal and state agencies cooperated to eradicate wild horses from western North Dakota. During the 1940s and 1950s, most of the remaining wild bands were rounded up or shot from aircraft. When Theodore Roosevelt National Park (THRP) was developed during the late 1940s, a few bands of wild horses were inadvertently enclosed within the Park's boundary fence. By 1960, they were the last surviving wild horses in North Dakota.

Between 1950 and 1970, the National Park Service (NPS) attempted to remove all horses from Theodore Roosevelt National Park. During the same time, the NPS also successfully fought inclusion under federal laws that were passed to protect wild and free-roaming equines in 1959 and 1971. Today, the NPS remains exempt from federal laws and regulations governing wild horse management on most public lands. Public opposal to the removal of the horses in THRO, and a growing recognition that wild horses had been part of the historical scene during the open range days, led to a change in policy during the 1970s. Since that time, the Park has tolerated a limited number of horses, which are managed as a "historical demonstration herd".

During the 1980s, however, Park administrators decided to modify the appearance of the wild horses by introducing outside bloodlines. The dominant stallions in the Park were removed or killed, and were replaced with an Arabian horse, Quarter Horses, two feral BLM stallions, and a part-Shire bucking horse. Several large roundups were held, and many park horses were sold at public auction.

At that point, horsemen Leo and Frank Kuntz of Linton, North Dakota, began buying as many of the original Park horses as they could, in order to save them from slaughter.

They became interested in the Park horses during the late 1970s, after purchasing a few individual animals for breeding and for use as a cross-country race horse. The Kuntz brothers became convinced that the horses represented a unique and historical type, and they admired their agility and stamina. Researching the origins of the horses, they discovered that Sitting Bull's confiscated Indian ponies had been purchased and range bred by the Marquis de Mores, founder of the town of Medora where the Park headquarters are located. They believe that the Sitting Bull horses contributed to the wild herds that still existed when the Park later enclosed the same range. The Kuntz brothers have since devoted their lives to preserving this unique strain, which now survives only on their ranch near Linton. Until the Nokota Horse Conservancy was founded in 1999, the Kuntz brothers were virtually the only force standing between the horses and extinction. Indian people and others urged the State of North Dakota to designate the Nokota Horse as the "Honorary State Equine", a recognition they received in 1993. The Kuntz brother's fight to preserve the animals and to have them returned to Theodore Roosevelt National Park was profiled on ABC's prime time broadcast in 1996. They and others feel that Park visitors should see the kind of horse that historically inhabited the badlands, and that the horses, who have survived against great odds over the century, deserve to return there. However, the NPS has declined to reinstate them into the Park, and has determined that no attempt be made to manage a historically accurate herd.

More recently, the plight of the Nokota Horses was brought to the attention of Aneata Hagy, co-founder of Perihelion Films in San Francisco, California. Since 1998, Hagy and her crew have been filming a documentary that will recount the story of the horses and the people who have fought so desperately to save them.