The Spiti Horse is a breed of small mountain

horse The horse (''Equus ferus caballus'') is a domesticated, one-toed, hoofed mammal. It belongs to the taxonomic family Equidae and is one of two extant subspecies of ''Equus ferus''. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 million yea ...

pony A pony is a type of small horse ('' Equus ferus caballus''). Depending on the context, a pony may be a horse that is under an approximate or exact height at the withers, or a small horse with a specific conformation and temperament. Compared ...

from

Himachal Pradesh Himachal Pradesh (; ; "Snow-laden Mountain Province") is a state in the northern part of India. Situated in the Western Himalayas, it is one of the thirteen mountain states and is characterized by an extreme landscape featuring several peaks ...

in northern India. It takes its name from the

Spiti River Spiti (pronounced as Piti in Bhoti language) is a high-altitude region of the Himalayas, located in the north-eastern part of the northern Indian state of Himachal Pradesh. The name "Spiti" means "The middle land", i.e. the land between Tib ...

, and is found mainly in the

Kullu Kullu is a municipal council town that serves as the administrative headquarters of the Kullu district of the Indian state of Himachal Pradesh. It is located on the banks of the Beas River in the Kullu Valley about north of the airport at Bh ...

, Lahaul and Spiti and

Kinnaur Kinnaur is one of the twelve administrative districts of the state of Himachal Pradesh in northern India. The district is divided into three administrative areas (Kalpa, Nichar (Bhabanagar), and Pooh) and has six tehsils. The administrative he ...

districts of the state.

History

The origins of the Spiti Horse are unknown. It takes its name from the

, and is found mainly in the

, Lahaul and Spiti and

districts of the state. A breed population of 4000 was reported in 2004; numbers appeared to be in rapid decline, and the breed to be in urgent need of conservation. In 2007 its

conservation status The conservation status of a group of organisms (for instance, a species) indicates whether the group still exists and how likely the group is to become extinct in the near future. Many factors are taken into account when assessing conservatio ...

was recorded by the

FAO The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)french: link=no, Organisation des Nations unies pour l'alimentation et l'agriculture; it, Organizzazione delle Nazioni Unite per l'Alimentazione e l'Agricoltura is an intern ...

as "not at risk"; in 2021 its status was reported to

DAD-IS DAD-IS is the acronym of the worldwide Domestic Animal Diversity Information System of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, within the FAO's management of animal genetic resources programme.Domestic Animal Diversity Infor ...

as "at risk".

Characteristics

The Spiti Horse has some similarity to Mongolian and Tibetan breeds; genetic diversity analysis shows it to be close to the Zanskari, which occupies a similar range in the

Himalaya The Himalayas, or Himalaya (; ; ), is a mountain range in Asia, separating the plains of the Indian subcontinent from the Tibetan Plateau. The range has some of the planet's highest peaks, including the very highest, Mount Everest. Over 100 ...

. Some interchange between the two breeds is documented; the Spiti breed, however, is less well adapted to very high altitudes. It is a small, sturdy mountain horse, well adapted to the harsh environment of the Himalaya. It is fast and sure-footed on mountain terrain, moves safely on ice, and has good stamina and resistance to cold and to disease. It is used both as a

pack animal A pack animal, also known as a sumpter animal or beast of burden, is an individual or type of working animal used by humans as means of transporting materials by attaching them so their weight bears on the animal's back, in contrast to draft ani ...

and for riding. The usual coat colours are bay,

black Black is a color which results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without hue, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness. Black and white ...

piebald A piebald or pied animal is one that has a pattern of unpigmented spots (white) on a pigmented background of hair, feathers or scales. Thus a piebald black and white dog is a black dog with white spots. The animal's skin under the white backgro ...

and

grey Grey (more common in British English) or gray (more common in American English) is an intermediate color between black and white. It is a neutral or achromatic color, meaning literally that it is "without color", because it can be composed o ...

References

{{Horse breeds of India Horse breeds originating in India