Since the mid 1990s the Department of Conversation has held an annual muster and cull of the Kaimanawa wild horses. Thousands of horses have been rounded up and removed from the Kaimanawa Ranges. At DoC’s discretion between 30 to 50% of these beautiful creatures meet their maker in an abattoir. Others are re-homed in domesticity through the help of volunteer groups like Kaimanawa Heritage Horses.
Kaimanawa wild horses breed at an average rate of approximately 17 – 18% per annum, slow in comparison to rabbits or possums but still at a rate that requires a regular management program to maintain DoC’s required level of just 300 in the wild habitat.
These figures show that Kaimanawa horses are breeding to be slaughtered. This does not make sense; not from a welfare point of view nor from an economic point of view. Other management tools are now being considered.
Immunocontraception offers hope that potentially the population growth could be slowed thus allowing fewer horses to be slaughtered, musters to happen less frequently and the wild population to receive less human interference.
