A bunch of the world’s final wild horses have returned to their native Kazakhstan after an absence of about 200 years. The seven horses, 4 mares from Berlin and a stallion and two different mares from Prague, had been flown to the central Asian nation on a Czech air pressure transport aircraft.
The wild horses, referred to as Przewalski’s horses, as soon as roamed the huge steppe grasslands of central Asia, the place horses are believed to have been first domesticated about 5,500 years in the past.
Individuals are identified to have been using and milking horses in northern Kazakhstan practically 2,000 years earlier than the primary data of domestication in Europe. Human exercise, together with looking the animals for his or her meat, in addition to highway constructing, which fragmented their inhabitants, drove the horses near extinction within the Sixties.
Filip Mašek, Prague zoo’s spokesperson, mentioned: “These are the one remaining wild horses on this planet. Mustangs are domesticated horses that went wild.”
The horses reintroduced into Kazakhstan are descended from two teams that survived in Munich and Prague zoos.
Initially, eight horses had been scheduled to journey, mentioned Mašek, however one horse sat down earlier than the flight from Prague and needed to be unloaded and returned to Prague zoo.
“He was just a bit dizzy returning, however he’s advantageous now. These horses have to face for all the journey – they will’t sit down, primarily as a result of their blood must flow into correctly. It’s a 30-hour journey in whole, and the horses will solely survive in the event that they stand all the way in which,” he mentioned.
Returning the horses from Prague zoo would assist enhance biodiversity within the area, mentioned Mašek. “The horses unfold seeds of their dung and after they dig up crops, they assist the water get down into the soil. In addition they fertilise the steppe with their dung.
“For me”, he mentioned, “the aim of a contemporary zoo isn’t just about defending and breeding endangered species, it’s about returning them to the wild the place they belong.”
Prague zoo’s director, Miroslav Bobek, mentioned the horses’ arrival was “virtually a miracle”, given the comparatively brief preparation for the relocation and surprising floods in central Kazakhstan final month.
“That is the start of a complete new chapter within the story of the final wild horse on the planet,” he mentioned in a press launch.
In 2011, Prague zoo was concerned in a reintroduction of Przewalski’s horses to Mongolia. The venture, which concerned 9 flights of horses, continued till 2019 when the inhabitants stabilised, mentioned Mašek, including that there have been now about 1,500 of the wild horses in Mongolia.
Mašek mentioned the plan was to move a complete of 40 horses to central Kazakhstan over the following 5 years.
This primary stage of the horse reintroduction concerned the Kazakh authorities’s forestry and wildlife committee, Prague zoo, Tierpark Berlin zoo, Frankfurt Zoological Society and the Affiliation for the Conservation of Biodiversity of Kazakhstan.
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