Equidae is the taxonomic family of horses and related animals, including the extant horses, asses, and zebras, and many other species known only from fossils. The family evolved around 50 million years ago from a small, multi-toed ungulate into larger, single-toed animals. All extant species are in the genus Equus, which originated in North America. Equidae belongs to the order Perissodactyla, which includes the extant tapirs and rhinoceros, and several extinct families.
Perissodactyla is an order of ungulates. The order includes about 17 living species divided into three families: Equidae, Rhinocerotidae (rhinoceroses), and Tapiridae (tapirs). They typically have reduced the weight-bearing toes to three or one of the five original toes, though tapirs retain four toes on their front feet. The nonweight-bearing toes are either present, absent, vestigial, or positioned posteriorly. By contrast, artiodactyls bear most of their weight equally on four or two of the five toes: their third and fourth toes. Another difference between the two is that odd-toed ungulates digest plant cellulose in their intestines, rather than in one or more stomach chambers as even-toed ungulates, with the exception of Suina, do.
Zebras are African equines with distinctive black-and-white striped coats. There are three living species: Grévy's zebra, the plains zebra, and the mountain zebra. Zebras share the genus Equus with horses and asses, the three groups being the only living members of the family Equidae. Zebra stripes come in different patterns, unique to each individual. Several theories have been proposed for the function of these stripes, with most evidence supporting them as a deterrent for biting flies. Zebras inhabit eastern and southern Africa and can be found in a variety of habitats such as savannahs, grasslands, woodlands, shrublands, and mountainous areas.
Hagerman is a city in Gooding County, Idaho, United States. The population was 872 at the 2010 census, up from 656 in 2000. The area is noted for its fossil beds and the Thousand Springs of the Eastern Snake Plain Aquifer. Hagerman is home to a national fish hatchery, a university research station, and extensive aquaculture, assisted by an abundance of geothermal water for temperature regulation.
The onager, also known as hemione or Asiatic wild ass, is a species of the family Equidae native to Asia. A member of the subgenus Asinus, the onager was described and given its binomial name by German zoologist Peter Simon Pallas in 1775. Six subspecies have been recognized, two of which are extinct.
A mastodon is any proboscidean belonging to the extinct genus Mammut. Mastodons inhabited North and Central America from the late Miocene up to their extinction at the end of the Pleistocene 10,000 to 11,000 years ago. Mastodons are the most recent members of the family Mammutidae, which diverged from the ancestors of elephants at least 25 million years ago. M. americanum, the American mastodon, is the youngest and best-known species of the genus. They lived in herds and were predominantly forest-dwelling animals. M. americanum is inferred to have had a browsing diet with a preference for woody material, distinct from that of the contemporary Columbian mammoth. Mastodons became extinct as part of the Quaternary extinction event that exterminated most Pleistocene megafauna present in the Americas, believed to have been caused by a combination of climate changes at the end of the Pleistocene and hunting by recently arrived Paleo-Indians, as evidenced by a number of kill sites where mastodon remains are associated with human artifacts.
Equus is a genus of mammals in the family Equidae, which includes horses, asses, and zebras. Within the Equidae, Equus is the only recognized extant genus, comprising seven living species. Like Equidae more broadly, Equus has numerous extinct species known only from fossils. The genus most likely originated in North America and spread quickly to the Old World. Equines are odd-toed ungulates with slender legs, long heads, relatively long necks, manes, and long tails. All species are herbivorous, and mostly grazers, with simpler digestive systems than ruminants but able to subsist on lower-quality vegetation.
The kiang is the largest of the Asinus subgenus. It is native to the Tibetan Plateau in Ladakh, northern Pakistan, Tajikistan, China and northern Nepal. It inhabits montane grasslands and shrublands. Other common names for this species include Tibetan wild ass, khyang and gorkhar.
Hagerman Fossil Beds National Monument is a Pliocene-age site near Hagerman, Idaho. The 4,351-acre (17.61 km2) Monument is internationally significant because it protects one of the richest known fossil deposits from the Blancan North American Land Mammal Age. These fossils date from 3.07 million to at least 4 million years ago in age and represent at least 200 species. Hagerman is best known for having the largest known concentration of the fossil horse, Equus simplicidins. The fossil beds, including the historic Smithsonian Horse Quarry, were designated a National Natural Landmark in 1975 and was reclassified as a National Monument in 1988.
Equus scotti is an extinct species of Equus, the genus that includes the horse. Equus scotti was native to North America.
The African wild ass or African wild donkey is a wild member of the horse family, Equidae. This species is thought to be the ancestor of the domestic donkey, which is sometimes placed within the same species. They live in the deserts and other arid areas of the Horn of Africa, in Eritrea, Ethiopia and Somalia. It formerly had a wider range north and west into Sudan, Egypt, and Libya. It is Critically Endangered, with about 570 individuals existing in the wild.
Hippidion is an extinct genus of equine that lived in South America from the Late Pliocene to the end of the Late Pleistocene (Lujanian), between 2.5 million and 11,000 years ago. They were one of two lineages of equines native to South America during the Pleistocene epoch, alongside Equus (Amerhippus) neogeus.
The evolution of the horse, a mammal of the family Equidae, occurred over a geologic time scale of 50 million years, transforming the small, dog-sized, forest-dwelling Eohippus into the modern horse. Paleozoologists have been able to piece together a more complete outline of the evolutionary lineage of the modern horse than of any other animal. Much of this evolution took place in North America, where horses originated but became extinct about 10,000 years ago, before being reintroduced in the 15th century.
Plesippus is a genus of extinct horse from the Pleistocene of North America. Although commonly seen as a subgenus of Equus recent cladistic analysis considers it a distinct genus.
The Hagerman Horse Quarry is a paleontological site containing the largest concentration of Hagerman horse fossils yet found. The quarry is within Hagerman Fossil Beds National Monument, located west of Hagerman, Idaho, USA, at the geographic division of the Snake River Plain. The Hagerman Horse Quarry is an integral part of the monument and is located on the northern flank of Fossil Gulch in the northern portion of the monument.
Haringtonhippus is an extinct genus of equine from the Pleistocene of North America The genus is monospecific, consisting of the species H. francisci, initially described in 1915 by Oliver Perry Hay as Equus francisci. Members of the genus are often referred to as stilt-legged horses, in reference to their slender distal limb bones, in contrast with those of contemporary "stout legged" caballine true horses.
The Turkmenian kulan, also called Transcaspian wild ass, Turkmenistani onager or simply the kulan, is a subspecies of onager native to Central Asia. It was declared Endangered in 2016.
James Williams Gidley (1866-1931) was an American paleontologist and museum curator.
Paleontology in Idaho refers to paleontological research occurring within or conducted by people from the U.S. state of Idaho. The fossil record of Idaho spans much of the geologic column from the Precambrian onward. During the Precambrian, bacteria formed stromatolites while worms left behind trace fossils. The state was mostly covered by a shallow sea during the majority of the Paleozoic era. This sea became home to creatures like brachiopods, corals and trilobites. Idaho continued to be a largely marine environment through the Triassic and Jurassic periods of the Mesozoic era, when brachiopods, bryozoans, corals, ichthyosaurs and sharks inhabited the local waters. The eastern part of the state was dry land during the ensuing Cretaceous period when dinosaurs roamed the area and trees grew which would later form petrified wood.
Horses have been an important component of American life and culture since before the founding of the nation. In 2008, there were an estimated 9.2 million horses in the United States, with 4.6 million citizens involved in businesses related to horses. There are an estimated 82,000 feral horses that roam freely in the wild in certain parts of the country, mostly in the Western United States.
