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Originally Posted by Ghoulish Delight
It should have stopped before the non-native species was introduced in the first place. But we're just a wee bit late for that. So we have to deal with the situation at hand. There's no need to make more of this than it is. It isn't a matter of irreversible environmental harm. It's a particular situation where someone screwed up a few centuries ago and now we're having to clean up the mess.
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The horse is native to North America. It disappeared due to climate change and human predation, then was reintroduced by the Spanish. Mitochondrial DNA comparisons show that "the modern or caballine horse,
E. caballus, is genetically equivalent to
E. lambei, a horse, according to fossil records, that represented the most recent Equus species in North America prior to extinction. Not only is E. caballus genetically equivalent to E. lambei, but no evidence exists for the origin of E. caballus anywhere except North America."
Ann Forstén, 1992. Mitochondrial-DNA timetable and the evolution of Equus: Comparison of molecular and paleontological evidence. Ann. Zool. Fennici 28: 301-309.