Sable Island Horses – Wild and Without Interference

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The Sable Island horses have been getting attention from the media lately, so for a little background on this herd, we are excerpting an article from the CBC News Network. Follow the link to read the rest of the article, hear audio and see more photos.

Sable Island horseThe wild horses of Sable Island are synonymous with the sandbar’s mysterious, untamed, romantic image. What is it about the horses that draws people in?

“Wild and free horses — I don’t think it’s too much more complicated than that,” said Bill Freedman, an ecology professor at Dalhousie University.

“I think some people understand that they don’t belong on Sable Island but they admire the fact that once they got there they managed to survive all by themselves without the aid of people.”

How did they get there?

Although a popular story is that the Sable Island horses swam ashore from one of the island’s many shipwrecks, scientists say there’s no genetic evidence to support that theory. In fact, historians believe the horses were deliberately introduced to the island during the 18th century.

The horses on Sable Island today are most likely descendants of animals that were seized by the British from the Acadians during their expulsion from Nova Scotia in the late 1750s and 1760s. Thomas Hancock, a Boston merchant and shipowner, was paid to transport the Acadians to the American colonies.

Hancock either bought or helped himself to some of the horses abandoned by the Acadians and is thought to have transported the horses to Sable Island along with cows, sheep, goats and hogs.

“They were introduced to the island and the idea was that the horses would take care of themselves, they would reproduce, their numbers would build up and periodically they could be harvested and sold at a profit,” said Freedman.

“At the same time that the horses were introduced, other domestic animals were as well — but only the horses survived in the longer term.”