- Common Name:
- Przewalski's Horse
- Scientific Name:
- Equus ferus przewalskii
- Type:
- Mammals
- Diet:
- Herbivore
- Group Name:
- Herd
- Average Life Span In Captivity:
- 20 years
- Size:
- Height at the shoulders 48 to 56 inches
- Weight:
- 440 to 750 pounds
- IUCN Red List Status:
- Endangered
- Current Population Trend:
- Increasing
What is a Przewalski’s horse?
Thousands of years ago, horses known as the takhi grazed on the grasslands of Asia and Europe. It wasn’t until the late 1800s when Russian explorer Nikolai Przewalski described and examined bones of the horses that the animals got the name Przewalski’s horses (often pronounced shuh-VAL-skee).
Less than a hundred years later, Przewalski’s horses became extinct in the wild following harsh winter conditions, inbreeding with local horses and excessive hunting. The subspecies was last seen in the wild in the late 1960s. Through captive breeding programs, the horses have since been reintroduced in some of their former habitats but remain endangered.
Are Przewalski’s horses wild?
Przewalski’s horses have been the subject of popular conservation efforts, in part because they are thought to be the last truly wild horses. But a 2018 study found that the horses may actually be descendants of domesticated equines that returned to the wild. That could mean the horses are feral, not wild. Regardless, Przewalski’s horses add to the genetic diversity of the horse family. Only around 2000 of the stocky caramel-colored equines exist today and work to grow populations is ongoing.
Behavior and reproduction
Horses aren’t solitary animals, and Przewalski’s horses are no exception. Przewalski’s horses form groups called harems, usually consisting of a dominant stallion that protects the group, several mares, and their offspring. Young horses typically leave the harem at reproductive age, around one to four years old. However, once these young horses leave their natal groups, they don’t typically live alone. Instead, females usually join other harems and males form bachelor groups with other young males.
A male will live with a group until it leaves to lead its own harem. Larger bachelor groups may also divide into subgroups. These bachelor groups aren’t isolated either—while dominant stallions often fight off outside males, a 2023 report described a stallion playing with a bachelor group as well. This behavior may be rare, and play within harems is better documented.
Mares give birth to individual foals after a roughly 11-month pregnancy. In its first day of life, a Przewalski’s foal is already trotting and neighing, and a month later begins playing with the other foals in its harem.
Horses may stay in an isolated harem structure or aggregate to form herds of harems. In a 2023 study, drone surveillance of a herd of Przewalski’s horses revealed that sibling relationships may play a role in how close harems are.
Habitat and diet
Przewalski’s horses once roamed the grassy steppes of Asia and Europe, but an increase in agricultural activity forced the horses east. They were last known to inhabit the Gobi Desert in Mongolia. This dry region is full of dense vegetation consisting of grasses and shrubs which the Przewalski’s would have grazed on. The last sightings of Przewalski’s horses were in this area in the 1960s.
Today, Przewalski’s horses mainly munch on grasses and some leafy plants but their pre-extinction diet was wider. Historically, the horses changed their diets seasonally, from grazing on grass in the summer to chomping on woody vegetation in the winter. Reintroduced Przewalski’s horses have not exhibited the same patterns. This may be because the horses were once hunted in the winter, and the introduced animals don’t have to seek refuge in trees like their predecessors.
Conservation efforts
Every Przewalski’s horse alive today is a descendent of around a dozen horses captured before the 1960s extinction. Already before Przewalski’s horses became extinct in the wild, breeding programs were in place in zoos across the world. These animals were protected from many of the threats wild Przewalski’s faced, including hunting and interbreeding with local horses. (Read more about efforts to breed Przewalski’s horses in captivity).
Starting in the early 1990s, reintroduction projects began to bring the horses back to their native habitats in Mongolia, China and Russia. At the turn of the century, over 30 horses were also released in the Chernobyl exclusion zone. This group almost doubled in population size within a decade.
Still, because today’s Przewalski’s descended from only about a dozen reproductively viable horses, lack of genetic diversity is a serious threat to their survival. Recently, scientists have tried to remedy this through cloning. Using the cryopreserved cells of a Przewalski’s stallion from 1980, scientists successfully cloned a foal in 2020 and then again in 2023. The DNA of the original horse isn’t present in the existing population, so these young, cloned horses could expand the gene pool by breeding with the current Przewalski’s horse mares. This genetic diversity is a step towards restoring what was lost when the horses went extinct in the wild and should ultimately help future Przewalski’s generations thrive.