When the Spanish explorers brought horses to North America, the horses were, in a sense, returning home. Beginning with their origins fifty million years ago, the wild horse has been traced from North America through Asia to the plains of Spain’s Andalusia and then back across the Atlantic to the ranges of the American West. When given the chance, these horses simply took up residence in the landscape that their ancestors had roamed so long ago.

In Wild Horses of the West, J. Edward de Steiguer provides an entertaining and well-researched look at one of the most controversial animal welfare issues of our time—the protection of free-roaming horses on the West’s public lands. This is the first book in decades to include the entire story of these magnificent animals, from their evolution and biology to their historical integration into conquistador, Native American, and cowboy cultures. And the story isn’t over. De Steiguer goes on to address the modern issues— ecology, conservation, and land management—surrounding wild horses in the West today.

Featuring stunning color photographs of wild horses, this extremely thorough and engaging blend of history, science, and politics will appeal to students of the American West, conservation activists, and anyone interested in the beauty and power of these striking animals.

J. Edward (“Ed”) de Steiguer is a writer and professor at the University of Arizona. He specializes in the federal lands of the American West and is an avid horse enthusiast himself. He is also the author of The Age of Environmentalism and The Origins of Modern Environmental Thought, the latter published by the University of Arizona Press.

"Perhaps the best book yet written on the plight of America's famous wild horses."—The Glenwood Gazette

“If wild mustangs could speak, surely the story told of their miraculous journey to defy extinction and come to inhabit the lands of the American West would be as close to Ed de Steiguer’s meticulously researched and masterfully written work than any I’ve read on the subject. With a narrative that reaches back 50 milllion years and gallops through the millennia to the present day—a time in which the plight of wild horses should command everyone’s attention—de Steiguer introduces us to a cast of memorable characters, both human and equine. The Texan-born Ed de Steiguer writes with an unabashed love for the land and its inhabitants, conjuring the spirit of times and places past and present, reminding us, as he puts it, that while history can teach us much about horses, it can teach us even more about ourselves.” —Mim Eichler Rivas, author of Beautiful Jim Key: The Lost History of a Horse and a Man Who Changed the World
 

“Author, educator, and academic, J. Edward de Steiguer, has crafted one of the most carefully researched and documented manuscripts on wild horses that America has yet produced. It will educate, entertain, enlighten, and inspire the reading public on a significant, but often misunderstood, natural resource management and animal welfare topic that has long needed objective historical, scientific, and political perspective. Its honesty is compelling and the author’s knowledge of and compassion for wild horses clearly shines through.” —Patricia M. Fazio, Wyoming Wild Horse Coaltion

Wild Horses of the West was recently awarded a Southwest Book Award, sponsored by the Border Regional Library Association, and selected as a CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title.