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Przewalski Horse
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From: lmassonn@esoc.esa.de (L. Massonne x2027 A115 mbp/fcsd/oad)
Date: Tue, 28 May 1996 11:53:18 GMT
Here is what my books say about the Przewalski Horse:
The last existing real wild horse, named after the Polish colonel Nikolaj
Przewalski, who discovered on his third expedition to central Asia 1879-80
two herds of the animals, until then unknown to science.
The wild horses lived on the Dsungarian steppe and in the western border
regions of Mongolia and China, from the Altai mountains up to the Gobi desert.
In 1947 the last wild horse, a mare, was caught in the wild. In 1967-68
Mongolian and Chinese scientists sighted 5 or 6 horses in the desert, but
probably the Przewalski wild horse is now extinct in the wild.
About 600 animals are alive today, spread over 95 zoological gardens and
animal sanctuaries all over the world. The zoo at Prague keeps the breeding
records of the Przewalski horse.
All horses kept in the West are descendants of 25 foals, which were imported
by the Hamburg-based animal merchant Karl Hagenbeck around the turn of the
century and sold to several zoos. By this the last wild horse was saved
from extinction. With the success of the breeding program (meanwhile the
1000th foal is born) it is planned to re-introduce the wild horse to large
area habitats.
The height at the withers of the compact, heavily boned and massive wild
horse is about 133 cm. Exterior: Rough, heavy Roman-nosed head, short neck,
short, barrel-like trunk,declined croup and strong legs. The coat colour
displays light and dark shadowing in light brown with darker colouring of
the longer coat hair and the legs. Special designations are the white
muzzle, the brush-like upright mane without forehead locks, thinly coated
dock, dorsal stripe and sometimes zebra-like stripes on the legs.
Although the Przewalski horse has 66 Chromosomes and the domestic horse only
64, they can be crossed without problems and produce fertile offspring,
which can only be explained by a very close evolutionary relationship.
The largest herds of Przewalski wild horses are in the USSR and in the USA.
In the Federal Republic of Germany about 70 of these horses are kept,the
Munich zoo has a herd of 21 animals. Smaller herds can be found at Berlin
(5), Duisburg (3), Karlsruhe (3), Cologne (8), Muenster (2), Nuremberg (13),
Sababurg (7) and Springe (8). (in 1987) (3)
....
... also this wild horse was eagerly hunted and would have disappeared from
the face of the Earth like the Tarpan,had not a merchant named Assanow been
acquainted with Friedrich von Falz-Fein, the then leader of the nowadays
worldwide known zoological field station Askania Nova in the Ukraine.
When Falz-Fein heard about those wild horses, he ordered Assanow to
get him live animals.
Carl Hagenbeck then bought a whole herd, 28 animals, for Hamburg and bought
in 1902 some additional mares and stallions. This Hagenbeck Przewalski
horse herd is the basis of all wild horses nowadays kept in zoological
ardens. However, there had been crossing experiments with the animals, which
led to the danger to destroy the pure-bred Przewalski horse, but
fortunately enough pure-blooded animals remained.
In 1960 the zoo at Prague established the breed registry in which all
Przewalski horses kept in zoological gardens are registered.
It is not known whether there are remaining animals in the wild. At least in
the zoos the breed seems to be saved, which also shows the importance of
zoos as keeper of otherwise extinct species ...(2)
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