Nokota® Horses

The Nokota horse descends from the last surviving population of wild horses in North Dakota. For at least a century, the horses inhabited the rugged Little Missouri badlands, located in the southwestern corner of the North Dakota. When Theodore Roosevelt National Park was created in the 1950s, some of the wild bands were fenced in, an accident that proved to have far-reaching consequences. While the raising of federal fences provided the horses with a measure of protection, the National Park Service (NPS) does not allow wild or feral equines, and is exempt from related protective legislation. Consequently, the park spent decades attempting to remove all of the horses. During the 1980s, Frank and Leo Kuntz began purchasing horses after N.P.S. round-ups, named them “Nokotas,” and started to create a breed registry. Learn more go to www.nokotahorse.org 

This is a video of the annual Nokota Horse Observation and Application Clinic in Linton,North Dakota.  Hope to see you there June 10th -14th 2012.

Nokota Horses are athletic and beautiful. This is a video of Jack riding a 5 year old Nokota gelding named Koda. He is riding him in the Working Equitation Class at the Pin Oak Charity Horse Show in Houston,Texas 2012. This is a class with three phases. A dressage test, obstacle course and obstacle course at speed. This was Koda’s first show and he did fantastic! It is hard to believe he was a wild horse on the plains of North Dakota two years before this. His owner Terri Watts has done an amazing job with him and plans to show him in the future in Western Dressage classes and Working Equitation. Thanks Terri for letting Jack ride him!

A photo of Koda before the first Nokota Colt starting clinic here in Texas at Watts Way Arena. He is fresh off the winter prairie of North Dakota and a diamond in the rough!