Kaimanawa Horse - History

History

The first horses were introduced to New Zealand by Protestant missionary Reverend Samuel Marsden in December 1814, and wild horses were first reported in the Kaimanawa Range in central North Island of New Zealand in 1876 . The Kaimanawa breed descended from domestic horses that were released in the late 19th century and early 20th century in the middle of the North Island around the Kaimanawa mountains. Between 1858 and 1875, Major George Gwavas Carlyon imported Exmoor ponies to Hawkes Bay and crossed them with local stock to produce the Carlyon pony. These Carlyon ponies were later crossed with two Welsh stallions, Kinarth Caesar and Comet, imported by Sir Donald McLean, and a breed known as the Comet resulted. At some point during the 1870s, McLean released a Comet stallion and several mares on the Kaingaroa Plains and the bloodline apparently became part of the wild Kaimanawa population. Other horses were added to the bloodline through escapes and releases from local sheep stations and from cavalry units at Waiouru that were threatened with a strangles epidemic. It is also thought that in the 1960s Nicholas Koreneff released an Arabian stallion into the Argo Valley region. Throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, horses were harvested from the feral herds and used as riding and stock horses, as well as being used for their meat, hair and hides. Originally there were many herds that roamed land owned by the British Crown and the native Māori, but many were eradicated with the intensification of large scale farming and forestry operations combined with increased mechanization that decreased the need for stock horses. Kaimanawa horses today have the highest amount of genetic similarity with the Thoroughbred and other Thoroughbred cross breeds.

Pressure from land development and an encroaching human population reduced the range and the number of the Kaimanawa horses, and in 1979 it was found that only about 174 horses remained. Starting in 1981, the Kaimanawa population, range size, and herd movements began to be officially measured, and a protected area was formed for the breed in the Waiouru Military Training Area. Legislative protection was similar to the kiwi and other native species. There was a rapid increase in the herd size following the protection of the breed, and 1,576 horses were known to exist in the area by 1994. There is also a small population of horses on the Aupouri Peninsula at the northern tip of the North Island, which is mostly unmanaged by the New Zealand government. In 2008, the Kaimanawa herds were the focus of a novel called Kaimanawa Princess, by Dianne Haworth.