Group Fights U.S. Plan to Kill 76 Wild Horses

Seventy-six rare wild horses that wander North Carolina’s famed Outer Banks were penned at a stockyard Tuesday while supporters fought to keep them from being killed by the National Parks Service.

They represent about 40% of the total of 184 wild horses that graze in an area known as the Shackleford Banks. The animals are documented as descendants of mustangs that swam ashore from Spanish shipwrecks about 400 years ago.

“These horses most closely resemble the colonial Spanish horses and are a part of our heritage,” said Carolyn Mason of the Foundation for Shackleford Horses, which has been fighting to save the animals since they were rounded up last week.

The National Parks Service corralled all of the horses of Shackleford Banks and checked them for equine infectious anemia, a blood disease. The 76 found to have the disease were moved to the stockyard, where officials said they would stay only until the end of this week before being put to death unless someone found them a new home that met federal regulations.