Wild Horses: America's Most Beloved Invasive Species? 

I love how people rate an animals importance by how cute they are or how close they are to a pet.

I'm so glad I discovered this channel! So interesting!

Target: You go for some shampoo and leave with a horse.

We have the same problem in the Phoenix Park in Dublin with wild deer that live there. They aren't invasive, they live in a city park, their population is very strictly controlled. But people walk up to them, (they could gouge your guts out with those antlers), feed them (poisoning them) letting their dogs run after them (stressing them out making them more likely to die from stress. Stressed animals don't mate or eat).

For one invasive species to call another species "invasive", it is a weird one for horses to be called invasive in their own homeland.

So glad Eons mentioned this! I didn't even know the Outer Banks had wild horses too! Thought at first this was gonna be about Assateague.

Horses actually evolved and adapted in the americas, alongside many other ungulates during an early migration period. Including but not limited to; mammoths, mastodon, bison, deer, elk, antelope, mountain goats, bighorn sheep, camelids (which includes camels, Llamas and alpacas) and many more. They are native to this land, we just so happened to have reintroduced them. Just like we reintroduced wolves to yellowstone.

Oh, it's Joe. I love this series. 😍

Your videos always leave me wanting to know more and I usually find myself -researching- searching about the topic you talk about. Thanks

i came here from pbs eons, and im glad i found that gem of a channel :)

Another theory for the origin of these coastal horse populations is that colonial era farmers stowed horses on the barrier islands to avoid taxation.

"They're damaging the landscape!" **drives truck on beach**

Barrier Islands should really all be protected land that never had significant human development, anyway. St Mary's National Sea Shore in Georgia is a great example of this. Galveston, on the other hand, is a terrible example of this. But that Island is far, FAR more developed than any of the southeastern Islands I've seen. It *was* supposed to be Houston before the Galveston hurricane.

Mustangs lived here for a long time without overly straining the environment, the issues now are because they're being aggressively displaced by cattle farming.

You can watch the host cringe a little when he endorses target lol

In 1985 my mother, sister and I went to Assateague. My sister went to play in the ocean, I went to find some wild ponies. And I found them. I saw them and they saw me. I moved slowly toward them until one, probably the stallion, turned to face me and gave me a warning snort. Now, I've been riding horses since 1963, and while I only rode nice, tame horses, I heard that snort before and knew what it was. I crouched down, and no longer approached them. The one that warned me off, stayed on the side of the herd I was on, and continued to watch me, but since I was keeping my distance and I was out in the open, he didn't feel the need to warn me again. I stayed there and watched them for about 20 minutes before I got up and moved away. Now, since I do know horses, I continued to look back at the herd since I didn't want the stallion to feel emboldened to come after me. Not that I backed away, but I kept looking back. Those ponies don't seem to be quite as accustomed humans as these bank horses. Granted it was 35 years ago, but the ponies are also not getting quite as much human interaction since Assateague is a protected island.

Hey, I thought I recognized that voice! Cool episode. Maybe after quarantine you can do one on invasive species in Hawaii.

I love this channel, it takes me to places that I could never visit (Antarctica) along with ones that are only a couple hours away. Fantastic, informative video! cant wait for more!

Horses seem to thrive in these ecosystems. There's another 500 year old population on Sable Island off the Nova Scotia coast.

Great show. Glad Eons suggested it. Always like Joe's "Smart" channel, too. Bit disappointed they are so East Coast-centric, particularly in an episode like this. They talk about a handful of horses on islands never intended to be lived on by either humans or horses, and virtually ignore the tens of thousands out west, living the lives their ancestors lived before extinction on this continent. THAT is the story of wild horses in America.

Just discovered that channel 2 days ago, and as always, anything from PBS is just amazing 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻

Interesting idea for a channel. One thing I've learned about NYC (primarily from "The Other Islands of New York City: a History and a Guide" by Sharon Seitz and Stuart Miller) is that right in the backyard of the biggest city in the US there are tons of island that have very little human contact. It would be fun to see a shot going over a densely developed part of the city, then a after a small patch of water, a little green speck. It would pitiably be hard to get the permits, but it might be worth it.

This was very enjoyable, im here from PBS Eons

'many view them as an invasive pest and one that's damaging a fragile landscape' ... while trucks are being driven up and down on the beach...

Eons sent me. Glad they did! Hi Joe!

Thank you. Please continue to provide these snapshots of interesting current life. ⚘

Sent from Eons! Love this!

Been staying in Corolla in the Out Banks this week when I remembered this video and was pretty sure it was about this very island. Haven't seen any wild horses this week, but I'm glad I looked it up again.

I'm late to the party but EONs sent me here. Would've been here sooner if I knew Joe was hosting this. As for the horses, I once camped out there and it was little scary hearing the horses approach your tent in the middle of night. Good experience overall!

Wild Horse literally told me a few thousand years ago that they'd be back to North America

They're called charismatic megafauna, people give them importance because they're so big, visible and beautiful.

Speaking of invasive species. We are best example.

It's irrational to discriminate invasive species and give some of them more protections than native ones.

That's so interesting! Thank you for the video!

Hi team Another cool episode.. Thanks..🙏👍

Thank you Target and PBS

I love this channel is active again!

Joe you are great!!! Do more videos I love them!

Everman in Texas just south of Fort Worth. Has a colony of 2000+ Quaker parrots

I never knew about this. How fascinating!

3:47 The damage out west is from cattle ranchers, not wild horses! And the wild horse population would be naturally controlled if the wolves and cougars weren’t hunted so heavily!

I miss Caitlin and Arlo you guys!

1:44 this horse just phased into reality

The channel *Origin of Everything* sent me here! So cool 🤩

Fascinating. I have to admit that I would be fighting the temptation to approach the horses too. I am an incurably "horse crazy" kid at heart. But I find it amazing and really great that they've found a way to help control the population, AND still let the horses stay mostly wild. Birth control seems far better than culling, which I believe is what they've had to resort to with the Mustangs out west from time to time.

There are 2 great solutions for this problem : Panthera onca and Canis lupus.

Thank for the content

Wow! This is a great channel. I would love to see a video like this over the wild mustangs, or if you’re brave enough.... a video over America’s truly most beloved invasive animals, domestic cats and dogs!

Considering that horses originated in the Western Hemisphere, they aren't invasive. They've simply been returned home.

Thanks Eons 🙌🏻🙌🏻

Thank you for a view into the US that's hard to see these days. I miss watching life as it is and not caring about anything else.

These islands will be under water in 10 - 20 years, probably less, so some accommodation will have to be made for the horses eventually.

Check out the Namib Desert Horses, probably the only feral horses in Africa. They date from WW I when Germany lost then South West Africa to the British.

Eons sent me! awesome channel! :D

Ehm... the horses damaging a fragile landscape? Pardon me... how about the dozens of SUV's and Trucks driving around the same landscape?

Wild horses are no different as wild pigs. Except the horse gets a pass for being a charismatic megafauna.

I don't know if they're America's most beloved invasive species, but they couldn't drag me away.

Nevada has a love hate relationship with the wild horses there. The Nevadans mostly like the horses, there are people who get miffed when one jumps a fence and mates or the entire heard hit the haystack. The Bureau of Land Management rounds them up from all over the state for prison inmates to tame / break. The remaining horses that were rounded up, well that's where all the controversy begins....

Thanks Eons showed me this

The amount of development and infrastructure there looks to be much more invasive.

It is ironic that horses are called an invasive species in North America, when they evolved there and were present until 10 000 years (even the still existing species Equus caballus), which is nothing in evolutionary time. Many plants and animals probably still retain adaptions to live with horses. We just need predators (wolves, cougars, bears or jaguars) to be present in areas were wild horses live and the ecosystem gets more balanced. I see that on an island that is no possible, but in the prairie this would be feasible.

PBS Eons sent me here!

Hey what happened to narrator from antartica series? Really liked her voice.

I wouldn't call them invasive, they first evolved in North America, crossed the land bridge into Asia, and were reintroduced to the Americas by the Spanish. The first of them was called Eohippus, or Dawn Horse, a little dude about the size of a medium sized dog with four toes.

There are actually several papers supporting the origin of E. ferus in the Americas, and having been present until earlier in the Holocene (possibly as soon as 5kya)

Thanks joe

My father-in-law was a Target Executive. Norm Mcmillan would have enjoyed this video. His vision was to improve our world, and our way of looking at the problems we deal with. He has been gone now from this earth for four years, still, Norm cared about our world and wanted the best for us. All of us.

PBS Eons sent me! :)

How can us humans talk about invasive species without biting our own tongues?

LOVE HORSES WITH ALL MY HEART AND ALWAYS WILL

Title says 4k but the video quality doesnt go up that high?

deep look sent me here 😁and im glad

Had no idea Joe from its okay to be smart was working with pbs terra, but boi oh boi was I happy to hear it!

My favorite memory of my first trip to the Outer Banks (1990’s) was a beautiful stretch of unoccupied (tourist) beach covered in huge clam shells and a small band of wild horses. On the way back down the dirt road, we came across two stallions standing slightly away from the road nuzzling each other. My worst memory of my second trip to the Outer Banks (about 10 years later) was the unoccupied beach was no longer unoccupied and condominiums had sprung up all down the stretch of the dirt road leading to the beach. Unfortunately there wasn’t a single sign of any wild horses and it just about broke my heart. The horses aren’t the problem. They have learned to adapt to the conditions of living on the barrier islands. It is humans and technology and “progress” that is the problem.

“What do horses like to eat?” “They like apples, pears, they’ll graze on oats…” **dude down the beach is feeding them cheetos** “Bruh…”

The horses are a Problem but not those GARGANTUAN cars destroying the beach? Or the many wood shed (houses?) plastered right into the dunes? America has odd priorities.

In what way is a species that spent millions of years evolving on a continent “invasive”?

Well now I want to go visit! Conundrum!

"there so invasive!" ...Drone view shows 2 horses & about 50 part time vacation mcmansions...

Unfortunately, the genie is out of the bottle. Only way you're gonna get rid of the interaction between the horses and the humans is to get rid of one of them.

It looked like the trucks were a worse invasive species than the horses.

In NorCal, people try to have the wild horses adopted

I love it when humans have the audacity to call other species “invasive” pot meet kettle.

The horse family, Equidae, has existed for 50 million years, nearly the entirety of the Cenozoic, and for the vast majority of that time, equids had been endemic to the North American continent, having only expanded outside North America 3 million years ago, and the last of North America's wild equids only died out roughly 10,000 years ago, a mere blink of the eye in evolutionary time-scales. Additionally, amongst the last wild equids to live in North America was the species Equus ferus, which today includes the modern domestic horse, Equus ferus caballus. So, while modern North America's "wild" horses are not exactly the same as those that lived at the end of the Pleistocene, they are indeed native. While it is true that North America's feral horses have caused land & ecosystem degradation across much of the continent, however, that is NOT because they are "invasive", it is because of over-population of their habitats due to the utter devastation of North America's top predators, to the point that most feral horse populations exist in places where most, if not all of North America's top predators have been extirpated (local extinction), with the only exception being Cougars. The problem of using Cougars to control feral horse populations is that in most places where feral horses & Cougars overlap, Cougars are heavily hunted, to the point that their populations become dominated by what amounts to teenagers, young & inexperienced, these young Cougars are incapable of preying upon feral horses beyond neonates. And even in the few places where Cougars aren't hunted, their effectiveness as horse-predators varies from place to place, because, as ambush predators, Cougars require either broken topography or dense vegetation (or both) in order to effectively prey upon feral horses, and even then, they can only prey upon horses that are up to roughly one year old. Now, why are cougars so heavily hunted, you may be wondering, the reason for why is because in most places in North America where feral horses live are public land, specifically BLM (Bureau of Land Management) owned land, the same public lands where ranchers like to bring their cattle & other privately-owned, non-feral domestic livestock to forage (which, by the way, VASTLY outnumber feral horses), thus, to protect the cows & other livestock, the cougars are heavily hunted to the point that their populations become dominated by what amounts to teenagers. Fortunately, this isn't true for ALL of North America, as there are a few feral horse populations that live with the full suite of North America's top predators, such as in the Chilcotin region, British Columbia, Canada. In the Chilcotin, feral horses live right along side all of North America's top predators (with the exception of Jaguars), Cougars, Western Grey Wolves, Black Bears, and Grizzlies. Although, in the Chilcotin, it appears that the effectiveness of top predators to regulate feral horses varies from place to place, for a couple of examples, in places such as the Nemaiah Valley, where a small ranching community exists, the combined impacts of feral horses & cattle seem to have a degenerative impact on the land, despite the presence of top predators. However, in other, more remote places, where ranching doesn't occur, such as the Brittany Triangle, the combined impacts of grazers in the form of feral horses & browsers in the form of moose have made the Chilcotin a more biodiverse, mosaic landscape of forest with meadow patches, within the forest matrix, the feral horses have created a complex network of trails that many other animals presumably use to either move through the forest or to move from one patch of meadow to another, and finally, within the meadow-patches themselves, when under top-down regulation by top predators, feral horses seem to have a very heterogeneous impact, with the vegetation at various sites being impacted at varying degrees, quite possibly creating micro-habitats that other species may be using.

Wild grazers are good for the environment, millions of native buffalo used to roam the plains and maintained to hundreds of miles of grass lands.

His soul so dead when trying to say thanks to target for mass consumption of plastic goods that destroy the environment

Guess I should’ve closed my eyes when you drove me to the place where your horses run free.

I love how he calls the horses an invasive pest damaging a fragile landscape while the vid shows 4 vehicles driving by digging up the sand...

4:45 can someone explain why it is bad to put your hands on the side of a horses head? I tried googling and got nothing...

"Horses are seen as an invasive species" as people DRIVE ON THE BEACH.

The trucks on the beach and all the houses look a lot more damaging than a few horses...didn't look trampled either but the roads that paved over the landscape are obvious.

You could avoid these problems by just moving all the horses to the mainland, just an idea.

That these charming, iconic creatures could be harmful is probably misunderstood by most Americans. Sad to see the conflict in emotions and solutions.

I'm here thanks to Eons, and really looking forward to seeing more Overview episodes. This one was wonderful. Confession: I was a horse-mad girl most of my life, and have settled down to being merely horse-adorer. That being said,, I must protest the idea that the *horses* are the invasive species to worry about. Are you kidding me? As you say, horses have been on the outer islands for 500 years. Trouble didn't start until European humans arrived en masse. I'd rather see humans kept out and off the islands than the horses!

Pickups on the beach.. speaking of invasive species. Well so are pickups in an urban environment.

Horses were native to the America's, but they went extinct now they are back.

Anyone else find it odd that we're talking about wild horses causing damage to fragile eco systems while pick up trucks are parked on the beach with beach houses in the background?

Why is it allowed to drive on the beach and to build houses in the dunes, but people complain about horses?

The Large herd of Sable Island Horses on the beach.And they made from in Canada. 🏀🐴🇨🇦🍟🏖🛻

I bought a mustang (captured in the ?Devil's Garden" of northeastern California) because he has near-perfect conformation. (He also has a very nice temperament indeed.). If you download the Bureau of Land Management's "On-Line Corral", you may be surprised to see how many of the mustangs have excellent conformation. I myself certainly was surprised. The Iberian blood is certainly evident, especially in strong, short, close-coupled backs (with correct tripartite conformation, i.e., the shoulders/barrel/hindquarters being of equivalent size). Yes, a percentage of the mustangs have lousy conformation, but they are a minority. The rest would be very attractive large ponies. Mine looks like an expensive Connemara hunter-show-pony.