Jprater…good questions.
BLM mustangs are those that come from the government’s adopt a wild horse program. That means that they are taken from a feral herd somewhere in the US.
Spanish mustangs are generally ranch raised or now raised by people like me…smaller breeders. The ranchers are mainly preservation breeders focused on maintaining the bloodlines and keeping a good number of foals coming…my focus is on breeding high quality foals for english sports.
Kigers are BLM mustangs that come from a specific herd management area (HMA). Kigers are thought to be spanish in descent but DNA test show them to be more QH than anything else. They were not accepted into the Spanish Mustang Registry which is the registry my horses are from. Not saying they aren’t really nice horses but their purity of blood is very suspect…and that is very unfortunate.
OK…now what is the real difference? Virtually 100% of todays feral horses are crossbreds of some type. The originial mustang was a spanish pony descended from the horses brought by the conquistadors to the New World. The horses brought over from Spain were thought to be Spanish Barbs (endangered), Spanish Jennets (now extinct) and Sorraia horses which still survive in a very small area of Portugal. These horses were taken by indians, got loose…etc… and interbred to create the vast herds which once roamed the plains. When Louis and Clark went west to survey the Louisana Purchase they wrote of the incredible quality of the indians horses…and no surprise because what they had were the same horses the Conquistadors brought. These same little horse outran the US Cavalry mounted on TB’s and grain fed and it was finally by killing off the indian’s horses (literally) that they were subdued and kept on the reservations.
Anyway very few of the spanish horses that survived the extermination of the indian’s herds made it into this century without being mixed with ranchers horses or later in the 20th century with horses turned loose intentionally to improve them. Back in the 1920’s a group of men were gathering as many of the pure spanish horses remaining that they could find and they were taken not just from feral herds but from indian tribes (they were allowed to keep a few horses) and some ranchers who had kept herds themselves. San Domingo who Margurite Henry wrote about was one of these first horses found and I think he came from an indian tribe in New Mexico. He’s also a Breyer Horse model I think.
Anyway the Spanish Mustang Registry was formed in 1957 and since then has worked very hard to save this endangered breed and to find as many of the remaining pure spanish horses they could find. We now believe there are virtually none left running wild. Estimates put about 2000 to 2,500 alive today and registrations over the last 50 years total about 3300.
As for what makes them suitable for sport horse disciplines you only need to look at one. They have the same build as modern spanish horses, the same tractable dispostions, and IMO better sport horse type movement.
Here are some pics of my stallion at his first dressage show.
Cisco’s First show thread
They do make superb trail, endurance and ranch horses…no doubt about that! Myself and several other breeders across the US are now training and promoting them in english sports and you will start seeing a lot more of them as folks catch on to what great little horses they are.
I honestly don’t know if anyone will add this blood to WB programs with the current thinking the way it is but I do think they would have a lot to offer much like the infusion of arab blood does. Perhaps as we get some horses out and folks see what they can do, more breeders will be interested in giving a cross like that a try. I have bred my stallion to several pony mares of other breeds and we have an arab cross filly and a QH cross colt on the ground now…both turned out very nice and sporty with nice temperments. They are noted for soundness, good bone, good temperments and they have the uphill build desirable for sport horses.
and that was with an Individual Olympic Gold Medallist on his back.