Nokota

The Nokota is an equine race original which lived free in Badlands of the Little Missouri, located at the south-west of the North Dakota. The first Europeans met for the first time these wild horses in the area at the end of the nineteenth century, when the industry of the cattle developed towards north. During the period of the breeding in opened spaces, certain escaped domestic horses crossed with the wild bands, and without any doubt contributed to the wild herds. Theodore Roosevelt, which created a ranch in the area of Little Missouri between 1883 and 1886, wrote:

" In much of places, in fact in the majority, one finds horses wild, which although invariably descendant of domestic species, being themselves or their escaped parents of some ranches or Indian campings, is now as wild as the antelope of which they invaded the domaine."

During the beginning of the twentieth century, wild bands of horses continued to traverse hard Badlands. The local peg ladders often captured them, at the same time for the sport and the profit. Following the dryness and depression of the years 1930, federal agencies and state one cooperated for éradiquer wild horses of the west of North Dakota. During the years 1940 and 1950, the majority of the remaining wild bands were captured or cut down since planes. When the National park Theodore Roosevelt was developed at the end of the years 1940, some bands of wild horses were found by inadvertency inside the fences which close the park. In 1960, they was the last wild horses surviving in North Dakota.

Between 1950 and 1970, the National Park Service (NPS) tried to withdraw all the horses of the National park Theodore Roosevelt. During same time, the NPS also victoriously fought in 1959 and 1971 of inclusions to the federal laws aiming at protecting the wild horses. Today, the NPS remains exempted federal laws managing and controlling the management of the wild horses in the majority of the public grounds. Opposition of the public to the removal of the horses in the Park, and the rise of the recognition of the big part of the role of the horse in the history of the ranching, resulted in changing policy during the years 1970. For this time the Park has tolerated a small number of horses, which are managed as a " herd of demonstration historique".

During the years 1980, however, the administrators of the park decided to modify the appearance of the wild horses by introducing external lines of blood. The standards dominating of the Park were withdrawn or killed, and replaced by Arab horses, Quarter Horses, two Mustangs of the BLM, and a bucking horse resulting from a Shire. Several great captures (roundup) took place, and much horses of the park were sold with the public biddings.

This point, the men of Leo horses and Frank Kuntz de Linton, in North Dakota, started to buy as many original horses of the park than they could, in order to save them butchery.

They were interested in the horses of the Park at the end of the years 1970, after having bought some animals for breeding and to use them in races. The Kuntz brothers were convinced that these horses represented a single historical type, and they admired their agility and their strength. By seeking the origins of these horses, they discovered that the confiscated Indian ponies with Sitting Bull were bought and raised in free space by the Marquis de Morès, founder of the town of Medora, where the buildings of the park are located. They think that the horses of Sitting Bull contributed to the wild bands which remained until the fences of the Park retain them. The Kuntz brothers dedicated their lives to preserve this single race, which survives now only in their ranch close to Linton. Until Nokota Horse Conservancy is created in 1999, the Kuntz brothers were virtually the only force drawing up itself between these horses and their extinction. The Indians and others recommended to the State of North Dakota to indicate the Nokota horse like the " Honorary State Equine" , a recognition which it accepted in 1993. The combat of the Kuntz brothers to preserve this animal and to bring back it in the National park Theodore Roosevelt was the subject of an emission of the television channel ABC in 1996. They think thus that of others that the visitors of the Park should be able to see the type of horses which historically occupied Badlands, and which the horses which survived it through the centuries deserve to go back there. However, the NPS refused the reincorporation of these horses in the Park, and is given not to try to manage a historically exact herd.

More recently, the difficult situation of the Nokota horses was carried for submission to Aneata Hagy, Co-founder of Perihelion Films in San Francisco. Since 1998, Hagy and its team film documentary which will tell the history of these horses and of people who fought so hopelessly to save them.

External bonds

The Nokota Horse Conservancy, official organization of conservation of the equine race

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