Wild horses return to Kazakh steppes

Przewalski’s horses have returned to the steppes of Kazakhstan after nearly 200 years, as part of an ambitious scheme to reintroduce them to their ancestral homeland


PRZEWALSKI’S HORSE

Last wild horse species named after Russian explorer Nikolai Przewalski, who first identifies it

First domesticated 5,500 years ago – 2,000 years before first records of domesticated horses in Europe

Once roamed vast steppe grasslands of central Asia, but driven close to extinction in 1960s

Already reintroduced in China and western Mongolia, where population numbers around 1,000


Arkalyk: Six mares and one stallion flown from Prague and Berlin zoos – then released to Altyn Dala, Kazakh name for Golden Steppe

Caspian Sea
TURKMENISTAN
KAZAKHSTAN
Aral Sea
RUSSIA
UZBEKISTAN
Kostanay
Baikonur
Astana
Karagandy
KYRGYZSTAN
Almaty
CHINA
200km 125 miles

Project area of Altyn Dala Conservation Initiative (ADCI)


Sources: Reuters, BBC, ADCI
Picture: Newscom 
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