The Barb

History:
 The Barb is an ancient breed, and is the ancestor of many Spanish horses to date. Although its complete origins are unknown, it is believed to have been established in the Fertile Crescent of North Africa, a place that surrounds the countries of Morocco, Algeria, and Libya.

 The Berbers of North Africa prized the fast and agile Barb as great war mounts, using them when their large Muslim armies invaded Spain in the eight century. The name "Barb" actually originates from the group of barbarous people.

 By 1492, the Spanish had regained control of their country and began their explorations of the New World. They took with them many horses---descendants of the ancient Barb. The horses were originally taken to several islands throughout the Caribbean, where they were bred for multiple purposes, but later they were taken to what is now the United States, Mexico, and South America. From there, they became foundation horses for many popular American breeds---Quarter Horses, Paint Horses, Appaloosas, etc.

 During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, many horses had escaped and were taken by Native American tribes. At about the same time, the English had begun colonizing much of the east coast, and found these Spanish horses, thinking of them as native horses.

Barbs are the ancestors of many popular breeds, including
Spanish breeds and stock horses.

 Before long, the English began importing their own horses---racehorses of a Barb type with a little bit of added Irish blood. From there, of course, the English imports were bred with the Spanish horses, and  many horses made their way West with pioneers. However, it was during these westward treks that many of the breeds already living in the West became endangered. People didn't realize the value of the Spanish Barbs that were living in the West with Native Americans. As a result, they crossed their English horses with the ones that had been their for centuries, hoping to Americanize the ones that had seemed unappealing. Many were sold or slaughtered or extensively crossbred, nearly destroying the pure Spanish Barb. However, Western ranchers liked the breed and helped preserved the ancestor of America's stock breeds.

Breed Description and Uses:
Barbs are stocky, standing 14.2 to 15 hands high, and can come in almost every color, particularly dun, chestnut, grulla, black, bay, roan, palomino, buckskin, grey, and pinto. Their head is long and refined, with a broad forehead, short ears that point slightly inwards, and a refined muzzle that often sports crescent-shaped Roman noses. Their chest is strong, their ribs well-sprung. Much like Arabians, they only have seventeen ribs. Their shoulders are sloping. As for their back, it is proportional to the rest of the body, complete with short, straight loin, a rounded croup, and hindquarters that aren't very heavily muscled.  The legs are straight and strong, with clean cannon bones, strong, sloping pasterns, and hard hooves.

 Barbs makes excellent endurance and trial horses due to their stamina and agility.

Banker Horse

History:
 Off the Coast of North Carolina lay a group of islands known as the Outer Banks. Wild horses, known as Bankers, have lived there for centuries, carrying a blood variant that was present in ancient Spanish horses.

 During the times of the exploration of the New World, Spaniards had several breeding stations located throughout the Caribbean, where they would breed work and saddle horses. In 1526, eighty-nine horses from one island, Hispaniola, and 500 people travelled up the coastline of North and South Carolina  and Virginia in hopes of creating a colony. Their efforts flopped. Within the year, the colony disbanded, leaving behind deceased people and many horses to return the Caribbean island of Antilles. The abandoned horses travelled back to the coast of North Carolina, swimming to the nearby Shackleford Banks island. With no interference from mankind, the number of horses grew, helped along by groups of horses abandoned in shipwrecks.

Banker horses are relatively small, though they have the
proportions of a regular horse. source

 In 1926, National Geographic stated that 5 to 6,000 horses lived on the islands off the coast of North Carolina. By the late 1950s, thousands had been removed under the mistaken belief that horses and other livestock caused the Banks to wash away. Residents managed to convince the state legislature to stop removing horses until they had hard evidence that they were causing damage, but not before the majority had been taken away.

 Only 350 Bankers are left in the world today, with a herd 117 in Shackleford. The legislation protecting them limits their number, using birth control to do so. Excess horses are adopted out of the herd.

 Breed Description and Uses:
 Standing under 14.2 hands high, Bankers are compact with strong haunches and slender legs. His profile is straight.Bankers belong to the same group of old-style Spanish horses that the Paso Fino belongs to, coming complete with several inherited gaits: the running walk, single foot, amble, and pace. They come in chestnut, buckskin, dun, bay, and sometimes pinto.

 Though Bankers are protected in their natural habitat, several people have taken them off the island in past years and trained for personal use in driving, trail riding, and mounted patrols. 

The Abaco Barb

 During the time of the Spanish exploration of the New World, many Caribbean islands were used for the sole purpose of breeding cavalry, work, and saddle horses. Some researchers believe that not all of horses made it to the chosen destinations and were shipwrecked on the island of Abaco, located in the Bahamas, while others think that horses were taken there by a Cuban logging company in the late 1800s and later abandoned for some reason or another. Either way, the horses have remained there for perhaps over a century, untainted by human influence.

 Throughout the centuries, they have adapted well to the climate, finding both protection and forage in lush pine forests. With no natural predators, they multiplied almost exponentially and began to thrive, becoming a large herd, probably 200 hundred strong, that roamed pine forests and beaches, the sea wind in their face. They were free. Yet all that changed during the twentieth century. People began settling on Great Abaco, the main island of the group, and took advantage all natural resources. That included the feral equines.

 During the '60s, a road, stretching from one end of Abaco to the other, was made. Often, people would chase horses down the road until it collapsed from exhaustion or was roped by a man waiting at the side of the road. Legends about the horses and there tragic endings began to arise.

  Things became even worse for the horses when a young child climbed upon the back of one of the horses, getting killed as the equine bolted in fright. A bloodbath followed. Villagers, angry at the death of the child, slaughtered over a hundred horses, leaving only three horses, which were taken to a cattle farm by other residents, alive. once their numbers increased to 12, they were released. Thirty years later, in 1992, their numbers increased to a small band of thirty-five horses. But that didn't last. By '97, the number soon plummeted to seventeen, with many dying from pesticides, lack of medical attention, and mortal wounds inflicted by both humans and dogs alike.

 After hurricane Floyd, the horses returned to the farm. Yet something was not right. Four years passed, and not a single horse was born. One organization---Wild Horses of Abaco Preservation Society(WHOA)---has been working hard since 1992 to save the rare, endangered breed by publicizing their dilemma. In 2004, WHOA brought the remaining horses to Treasure Cay, Abaco, where a large piece of land given to them by the Bahamian Government was used as a sanctuary. Today, only five horses remain, and there have been no reproductions since 1998. WHOA plans on sending the horses to a University in the US to see why they are not reproducing. For the time being, WHOA runs on private donations, yet it is running out of funds.

Abaco Barbs are the world's most endangered breed.
credit

 In 2002, scientists tested the DNA, finding that the native horses were related to the original stock of Barbs brought to America from the Barbary coast.  The breed was therefore named "Abaco Barb" and was added to the Horses of the Americas registry.

 Abaco Barbs stand 13.2 to 14.2 hands high, and are small, sturdy, and compact with strong legs and white patches underneath their bodies. Their hooves were once tough, yet pesticide have weakened them. Because they have had so long to adapt, they are nimble, surefooted, and have a lot of endurance.