Wild Mustang Horses

While road-tripping high in the Sierra Nevada mountains, near Lake Tahoe and Reno, we came across a herd of wild mustangs grazing in the hills next to the highway.

Of the approximately 10 million horses in America, about 70,000 of them are wild and living on protected public lands. And over half of these wild horses live here, in Nevada, many of them clustered around Carson City, where we’re driving at the moment. Nevada is the seventh-largest state in size, and almost 90 percent of its land is owned by the federal government.

Wild Mustangs are icons of American culture. For Americans, wild horses are symbols of freedom. And their heritage is honored and protected. They are descendants of escaped, domestic Spanish horses brought to this land by early Spanish explorers.

Horses are naturally curious, so pulling over to the side of the road and taking some video of them was easy enough. They certainly are majestic beasts to behold.