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As tourism season approaches along the North Carolina coast, work intensifies to preserve and protect one of the greatest draws for visitors – the state’s wild horses. Public Radio East’s Annette Weston spoke with members of the organization that’s sole purpose is to protect the Banker horses from the greatest threat – well-meaning but unknowledgeable people.

The Banker hoses of North Carolina are wild descendants of Colonial Spanish Mustangs that have lived on the state’s barrier islands for about 500 years. While their exact arrival is debated, they are genetically confirmed to be one of the oldest and rarest horse strains in the world. Historians and geneticists point to three primary ways these horses reached the Outer Banks – shipwrecks, abandoned colonies, and English expeditions.

One herd lives in what’s known as the four-wheel drive area — an 11-mile stretch where the paved road, NC Highway 12, ends and the beach itself becomes the state road. It is the primary habitat for the Corolla wild horses.

The town of Corolla, which has population of about 1,000, swells to nearly 60,000 people during the peak tourism months, May through October, with the horses and the beaches the main attraction.

Managing the safety of the herd falls to the nonprofit Corolla Wild Horse Fund; challenges include the ever-changing nature of the barrier islands, encroaching development, and climate change. However, one of the greatest dangers is people.

“Horses are just inherently dangerous no matter where they are. I mean, whether they’re wild or in a domestic setting, I mean, they’re large, powerful, flighty animals. So, they’re dangerous,” said Meg Puckett, Director of Herd Management for the Corolla Wild Horse Fund.

She added that some visitors fail to recognize that these particular horses are far different from those at a petting zoo or a neighbor’s farm. “They’re very unpredictable. They can be standing there quietly one second and the next second, a fight breaks out, they spook, they run, you just never know. And so, I just think it’s so important for people to always keep that in mind and always just maintain a very, very healthy respect and quite frankly, a fear of these animals.

“You can certainly get hurt yourself. Kicks, bites, being run over, even being knocked into by a horse can hurt a person. You know, the horses themselves could potentially be harmed. Stress can cause all kinds of physical issues for horses, especially this time of year with foals. You know, pressure and stress and being irritated can cause mares to become very agitated. It can cause stallions to become agitated. It can cause exhaustion in foals if they’re constantly moving around to get away from people.”

Last November, a Corolla stallion named Topnotch was removed from the wild and is now living at the fund’s farm sanctuary in Grandy because he had become habituated. “And that’s when a horse just becomes so used to, so desensitized to people, to being approached by people, to being touched by people, that there’s no fear anymore,” she explained. “And so, they’re not moving away from people. And then they also may begin to approach people. And that’s when things get really dangerous.”

It’s also illegal to feed the wild horses. In 2020, a yearling colt in Corolla died a slow and painful death after someone fed it an apple, which caused it to choke. Another foal died previously after being fed a watermelon rind.

Meg said, “Anything that’s not natural can make them sick. They can colic, which is an intestinal issue. It’s upset stomach, but it can be fatal very quickly. They can choke. We’ve had horses that have been removed from the beach, but we’ve also had horses that have died after being fed things that they can’t swallow. And so, a whole apple, for example, if someone feeds a horse that, it can get lodged in their esophagus. and then they choke and they can die. So, when we say apples and carrots kill wild horses, we mean it very literally. We say that because it has happened before.”

But, by far, the biggest human-caused danger to the Banker herd comes from vehicles. Chris Winter is President and CEO of the Corolla Wild Horse Fund. He said, “Year over year, there are just more and more vehicles, and we’ve had a number of horses hit over the past two summers. So, whether you’re driving on the beach or behind the dunes, it’s really the same situation to just drive with exceptional care.”

In North Carolina, it is illegal to come within 50 feet — about the length of a large school bus — of wild horses. Violators can face civil or criminal fines, often reaching up to $500 per incident. Meg said it’s important that visitors follow that rule.

“If you stay 50 feet away, as the law states, you’re not petting, you’re not feeding, you’re not putting yourself in danger, you’re not putting the horses in danger,” she said, “And we promise it’s not going to ruin your experience. It’s probably going to make it even better because you’re watching these horses in their natural habitat doing what they do.”

There has also been an unprecedented spike in reports of unleashed pets spooking, chasing, or even biting wild horses. Meg cautioned, “They will not hesitate to protect themselves and their families if a dog is chasing them. So, honestly, your dog is going to be in more danger than those horses are. But at the same time, that doesn’t mean that it’s not dangerous for the horses too. They could get hurt, you know, if it spooks them and they run, you know, all kinds of things could happen. So, yeah, it’s really important that people have their dogs under control.”

While these animals are famous for surviving centuries of hurricanes, modern environmental shifts are also creating unprecedented challenges. Some are caused by the realities of life on a barrier island. Meg said, “Barrier islands are not stable pieces of land. Everything is always moving and changing. Our coastline is shifting all the time. Water, salinity levels, I mean, there’s just so much that changes on it just naturally, and that ‘s just part of life here. And so, it’s very important that we understand how that impacts the horses, whether it’s natural or it’s human caused. And some of that we can control, some of it we can’t control.”

In North Carolina, human development is another primary threat to the wild horse herds, particularly in the northern Outer Banks. Chris said the Corolla herd shares its territory with a rapidly growing vacation community, leading to shrinking habitat and increased human-horse conflict.

He added, “As if development continues at this pace, the entire habitat where the horses live is really going to be, is going to continue to be under threat. And, potentially there’s a point in the future where, we don’t know what the outcome is because there’s simply not enough up there for everybody, whether it’s people, horses, or other animals that rely on the ecosystem in the four-wheel drive.”

The Corolla Wild Horse fund is continually working with local and state officials to balance growth of the tourism industry and development alongside the need for conservation that protects the herd. The organization has used donations to buy undeveloped lots in the four-wheel drive area to prevent the construction of massive vacation homes that would otherwise block the horses’ natural movement and grazing paths. The overall goal is to create a permanent, north-to-south corridor of protected land so the horses can migrate between marshes and the ocean without being trapped by fences or residential landscaping.

“These horses have been a part of people’s lives for a long time on the Outer Banks. They’ve been a part of residents’ lives for a long time. They’ve been a part of vacationers’ lives for a long time,” Chris said. “And people want that story to continue. We want that story to continue.”