Mustang

The Spanish horses arrived from 1493 onward, and free-roaming herds were part of the West for centuries; by the 1950s an estimated 25,000 remained.

The Wild and Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971 put the herds under federal protection and the Bureau of Land Management in charge; about 17,300 horses were on BLM lands when it passed. Adoption of captured horses began in 1978. The herds have since outgrown the program: 88,090 on the range in 2019 against a bureau-wide management target of 26,690, with around 45,000 more in holding facilities.

Some herds are managed for old blood. The Pryor Mountain horses carry DNA-confirmed Spanish ancestry, and herds such as the Kiger and Cerbat retain strong Spanish type and are managed for it.

Typically 14 to 15 hands and rarely over 16, compact, with good bone and any coat color. The Spanish-type herds throw duns with primitive markings.

Generations of natural selection have produced hard feet, easy keeping and real soundness. A captured Mustang carries a freeze brand on the left neck encoding its year of birth and registration number.

The trade is the starting point. An adopted Mustang is typically unhandled and adult, which is a different proposition from a started horse, and it takes an experienced person and time.

Programs exist to close that gap. The Extreme Mustang Makeover gives trainers 100 days to start a horse before it is placed at auction.

The BLM's own record is the argument: nearly 290,000 horses and burros placed into private care since 1971, working as pleasure, show and work horses.

The Spanish-type herds also carry conservation interest, managed for the old genetics rather than for numbers.

Less feed and less farrier than most horses, if the herd's reputation holds for the individual: hard feet and easy keeping are what the range selects for.

What an unhandled one needs is containment and time, and an adoption comes with care requirements you agree to for the first year, before title passes.

Know which channel the horse came through. Adopted horses remain federally protected for the first year, and title passes only after it; sale-authority horses, older or repeatedly passed over, are sold outright under the 2004 Burns Amendment rules. The paperwork differs, and so do your obligations.

The economics are unusual: the base adoption fee has been 125 dollars, and since 2019 the BLM has paid adopters an incentive of 1,000 dollars. Cheap to acquire is not cheap to own; the cost is the training.

Read the terms on the BLM's Online Corral before you plan around one, and match the horse's handling status to your experience honestly.

Recent sale prices on HoofnHorn, where there are any, are further down this page.