Banker

Banker horses live on the barrier islands off North Carolina, and they have been there since at least the fifteen hundreds. They are a Colonial Spanish strain, descended from the horses Spain brought to the Southeast, left behind or swum ashore from wrecks and never reclaimed. North Carolina made them the official state horse.

The surviving herds are small and separate. Corolla, Shackleford Banks, Ocracoke and Currituck each hold their own population, and because the islands kept them apart, the strains differ from one another.

Four hundred years on sand and salt marsh selected an animal that holds condition on forage most horses would not touch, tolerates heat and biting insects, and has the hard feet you would expect from that ground.

That adaptation is also the thing to plan for. A horse built to live on marsh grass founders on good pasture, so a Banker needs its grazing restricted rather than improved. Most also come off the islands unhandled, which means real gentling rather than a refresher.

Buy through the herd's management group and ask which island the animal came from.