Kundudo horse

This population of horses owes its name to the biotope in which it has long evolved in the wild, Mount Kundudo.[1][2][3][4] Very little is known about their history, as there are no written sources.[2][5] Oral tradition, gathered from the oldest local inhabitants, has it that these horses have been known for over 200 years, and that the future emperor Haile Selassie I captured one of them with the help of his uncle, at the age of 10.[2][6] One oral hypothesis as to the origin of these horses is that their ancestors were military mounts left behind after the Ethiopian-Adal war, which pitted Muslim chief Ahmed Gragn against Christian chief Dawit II from 1528 to 1560.[2][5][7] It is possible that a small group of 10 to 15 horses survived for decades despite the past presence of lions and cheetahs.[6] However, there is no tangible evidence in favor of an origin theory.[8][9][10] The relatively close genetic distance between the Kundudo wild horses and the domesticated Abyssinian horses suggests, however, that the Kundudo may be a sub-population of Abyssinian horses that returned to the wild in the recent past,[11][12][13] perhaps during the military events of the 16th century.[12][13]

The horses of Mount Kundudo were rediscovered at the beginning of the 21st century, when a team led by Ethiopian researcher Effa Delesa Kefena explored the ecozones specific to Ethiopian horses.[5] This research highlighted the difficulties of communicating about Ethiopian horses, which are not even well known locally.[10] On 3 January 2008, the researchers first found a single mare, around 11 years old, with a hooves that had never been groomed and showing no signs of domestication.[6] They took a DNA sample and nicknamed her "Basra ".[6] In October 2010, they counted a total of 18 horses in the mountain area.[5][8] In 2013, a survey expedition was sent by the Ethiopian Biodiversity Institute, which counted just 11 horses.[5]

There is no stud book.[1] These horses are undergoing a process of re-domestication,[1][9][14][15] as some of them are captured annually by a local farmer, to be put to work.[5]

Basra, 11-year-old Kundudo mare

Their morphology is described as faulty, with irregular shapes, short backs with plunging toplines, and paunchy bellies.[1][14][16] However, the small number of horses studied means that no consistent morphological data can be deduced.[17][18]

Kundudo horses are one of eight horse breeds identified in Ethiopia.[19] And, along with the Borana (the Ethiopian breed from which it diverges the most[20]) Kundudo horses are most distant genetically from the other Ethiopian horse breeds.[11][21] This study attributes one gene cluster to Kundudo alone.[21] The Ethiopian breed closest to Kundudo is the Abyssinian.[11] The population also shows low genetic diversity,[11] the lowest of all Ethiopian horse populations studied.[22] It is likely that these horses have undergone a phenomenon of genetic drift, due to the low number of founder individuals, isolation over a long period of time, and the absence of crossbreeding with horses of external origin.[23] However, their genetic heritage is neither exceptional nor unique compared to other equine populations of this type.[24]

The Basra mare

Although these horses have returned to the wild, and constitute one of Africa's three "wild" horse populations,[25] some of them are regularly captured by a local farmer who puts them to work for harvest time, before releasing them.[6] They are considered to be of little use for this purpose, with little pulling power, and are resistant to the work demanded of them.[6] However, this farmer may have captured or sold some of the foals.[6]

Studies suggest that the grazing area at the top of Mount Kundudo could gradually be turned into a tourist attraction, along the lines of the Namib horse attraction,[6] based on the tourism potential of wild horse watching.[26] The Namib horses are known worldwide, wrongly, as the only "wild" horses in Africa.[2]

Kundudo mare and foal

The DAD-IS database provides no data on numbers,[1] but the herd is tiny.[27] These horses are essentially local, confined to the Mount Kundudo region of eastern Ethiopia,[1][14][16] where they are reputed to be rare.[9] They graze on an area of 13 hectares, and drink from a waterhole at the top of the mountain, which never dries up, even in the hot season.[6] They are the last wild horses in East Africa.[6] They are highly threatened with extinction, due to their rarity, consanguinity, poor breeding practices and the demand for their foals.[1][8] Since 2011, this animal population has been classified as critically endangered.[5] The Ethiopian Biodiversity Institute has put in place conservation procedures, including the freezing of stallion semen.[5] The breed's importance in terms of its link with Ethiopian history was emphasized.[28]

In 2016, CAB International listed the breed as "potentially extinct", the last recorded population of 11 horses in 2013 being too low to ensure the population's sustainability.[9]

• Ethiopian horses
• List of horse breeds

• Kefena, Effa; Dessie, T. (2011). The Kundido feral horses: Fugitives of the Abyssinian domestic horses. Vol. 25. Ethiopian Society of Animal Production (ESAP).
• Kefena, Effa; Dessie, T.; Han, J.; Kurtu, M. (2012). "Morphological diversities and ecozones of Ethiopian horse populations". Animal Genetic Resources/Ressources Génétiques Animales/Recursos Genéticos Animales. Animal Genetic Resources. 50: 1–12. doi:10.1017/s2078633612000021. ISSN 2078-6344. Retrieved 26 February 2018.
• Kefena, Effa (2012). Equine genetic resources of Ethiopia. Haramaya.
• Mulualem, Tewodros; Molla, Meseret; Getachew, Merkebu (2015). Assessment of livestock genetic resource diversity in Ethiopia: An implication for conservation. Vol. 3. Journal of Genetic and Environmental Resources Conservation.
• Porter, Valerie; Alderson, Lawrence; Hall, Stephen; Sponenberg, Dan (2016). Mason's World Encyclopedia of Livestock Breeds and Breeding (6th ed.). CAB International. ISBN 978-1-84593-466-8. OCLC 948839453.
• Viganò, Marco. Kondudo Feral Horses, essentials. IBREAM.