The blue-blood Exmoor ponies tied up in a DNA row

“Least said, soonest mended, because less chance of breaking,” wrote the Victorian novelist RD Blackmore in his classic West Country novel, Lorna Doone. Fast forward 150 years or so, and the book’s glorious setting, Exmoor, is chattering away furiously, with little chance of rapid resolution.

The cause of the row? The soft, shaggy, mealy-nosed Exmoor pony – a breed that nearly disappeared after the Second World War and is still in need of preservation, recognised as endangered by the Rare Breeds Survival Trust.  

One of the oldest of the 14 British native breeds, vital themselves for the conservation of moorland, the current number of semi-wild Exmoors living on the scenic acres is about 500, gathered in approximately 20 herds.

Small, sturdy, extremely hardy, and with very strong teeth for chomping through the moor’s tough vegetation, Exmoors feature in local records as far back as the Domesday Book (as well as Lorna Doone) and are said to have the look of ponies in ancient cave paintings. 

Those that live on the moors are not fed, they’re never ridden or have had so much as a halter near them. Each herd has a different colouring. 

With such a distinguished lineage, it’s perhaps no surprise that people are determined to maintain the purity of the bloodline of these ancient Britons measuring around 12.2 horse hands. 

This gives rise to the tricky question, what constitutes a genuine Exmoor pony in 2023? Experts, it seems, do not agree. The problem lies with the carefully maintained – and closed – Exmoor Pony Stud Book, run by the Exmoor Pony Society (EPS). If your pony’s name is not listed in the book, it’s considered less show, and more faux, pony.  

Entry in the Stud Book means that the pony is pedigree – and for those of us off-Exmoor, it sounds harder to get into than a swanky members-only club. Then again, if such paperwork maintains the authenticity of the breed, that has to be a good thing, surely? 

No, says Dawn Westcott who owns the Holtball Herd 11 of Exmoor ponies. Emphatically, no.

Until last month, Dawn co-owned the herd with her farmer husband Nick, who sadly died of cancer last month, aged 64. The couple had been not just at the heart of the argument, but were as closely involved with the issue as possible. After Nick’s death, Dawn remains determined to continue battling for what she believes in.

“The stud book was started in 1921, and Nick’s great-grandfather was a founder member,” she explains. 

The Westcotts can trace their farming heritage back at least 500 years, that’s 13 generations. 

After the Second World War, when there were very few ponies left, Nick’s family was involved in helping to rescue the breed. Back then, nobody would have challenged the idea that a pony born on the moor, that could survive on the moor and look exactly like all the others, was a real Exmoor. There was just relief that the breed was reviving. 

But then, in the early 2000s, DNA was brought in as a parentage requirement before an Exmoor pony could be “official”, and that’s when the rows began.

“For years,” says Westcott, of the requirement, “this has been excluding ponies that have all the characteristics of the breed, but gaps and errors within the DNA database and system have prevented conclusive DNA verification.”

Now, the stud book is closed to many ponies – except those already entered into the hallowed ledger.

Although the Herd 11 is primarily a pedigree Exmoor herd, the Westcotts are responsible for a wider Exmoor Pony Project which includes ponies from other herds, such as the nearby Molland Moorland Herd 99, whose ponies aren’t in the stud book in spite of – as Westcott says – being excellent examples of the breed.

Being in the stud book isn’t simply a status symbol, like having a Soho House membership card. 

“Without the pedigree, ponies aren’t valued as much and we risk losing track of them in rewilding projects,” argues Westcott.

“There is a small but significant population of pure bred Exmoor ponies who are excluded, resulting in the loss of these ponies from the recognised breeding gene pool.”

Westcott cites her own beloved rescue pony, Monsieur Chapeau, whom she found shivering and malnourished as a foal on the moors in 2014. In spite of DNA testing confirming his pedigree father, his mother couldn’t be identified from the pedigree mares on the moor, so he remains unregistered. He is magnificent, but effectively invisible in the breed.

And therein lies the rub. Westcott and her supporters state that if an Exmoor pony looks like one, walks like one (and is born into a herd where the owner says it is one), then it is highly likely to be a genuine Exmoor.  

“I don’t accept that he isn’t a real Exmoor pony,” insists Westcott, who says that a row over foals is one reason behind her membership of the EPS being revoked in 2014, which means they are prevented from exhibiting their ponies at EPS breed shows for members.

However, stomping their official hooves across the moor is the EPS, standing firm on the question of parentage defining pedigree.

It’s all quite simple, says chairman Nigel Hill. “In order to get into the stud book you need to know the parentage of the sire and dam (the father and mother). That’s now done by testing; the parents’ DNA is recorded, we take a hair sample from the foal and it’s sent to Wetherbys in Ireland to confirm.”

The foals then go through a physical inspection process which, says Hill, 99.5 per cent pass. 

Who fails? “Some might have a deformity,” he says, “and we don’t allow white markings.” A white star on the forehead, for example, means that the pony isn’t considered good enough to meet the breed standard, even though genetically they are an Exmoor pony. 

“The importance of the pure bred pedigree breed is that without these, you can’t have cross breeds. A fantastic horse for eventing, for example, is an Irish draft crossed with a thoroughbred.”

It’s a fair point, although it seems rather unjust for those ponies with stars on their foreheads or deemed not good enough and, as Hill himself points out, when there was an attempt to cross Exmoor ponies with thoroughbreds, the progeny weren’t hardy enough to survive winter on the moor, anyway.

Westcott is not convinced. She argues that the DNA process isn’t straightforward and that rejecting ponies on the basis of white markings is – to simplify a technical issue for the rest of us – unfair.

There are other, less polarised views. Robin Milton is the co-owner of Withypool Herd 23 and the chairman of Exmoor National Park Authority. He points out that keeping track of wild ponies isn’t exactly straightforward. 

“The problem is that when you have a stallion running with 20 mares,” says Milton, “or you’ve rounded up 40 sweating ponies from the moors for an annual check, you can’t be sure who belongs to whom.”

He adds: “Ours are entirely unhandled. We put them in a big temporary pen during the annual autumn check, sort the foals who are ready to wean, and older mares go to conservation grazing projects.” 

Fillies are, he says, easier to sell, if anyone wants them for riding, and colts mostly go for conservation grazing.

Nor is this the first time there’s been controversy. “Around 40 years ago there was a big fallout with the Exmoor Pony Society because they were ramping up the inspection regime. It tended to be the case that you went with what people said about parentage, and then DNA testing meant it was more strict.”

He says, diplomatically, that he sees both sides of the arguments, and hugely admires much of what Dawn Westcott has done.

“Dawn has been absolutely instrumental in dealing with the problem of abandoned ponies back in 2010, and was vocal against hot branding of non-moorbred foals, which upset some of the establishment.”

He also suggests that more genetic variability is needed. “There are so few being kept as wild herds. Now the DNA work has been done, this is perhaps a chance to reset, even if what is registered in the future isn’t a premier league pony.” The current database situation is not, he admits, ideal.

“There’s a feeling in my mind that with the levels of technology we have now, we can probably reset some of the problems,” says Milton. “Everyone needs to sit down together.” As an aside, he suggests that the Department for Environment Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) could help resolve the situation, but isn’t acting. 

In the most “no stone unturned” response to a situation, the Moorland Exmoor Pony Breeders Group is working with the Equine Survival Trust in the US to create a DNA database, and there is also the Exmoor Pony Whole Genome Project, working with genetic experts at Nottingham and Dublin Universities to map the entire Exmoor pony genome. This might seem a little over the top – only two other breeds of pony have had their genome mapped – but Westcott hopes that this might present a solution. 

“Ultimately, we are hoping to identify specific sequences within the genome that can help prove whether a pony is an Exmoor, and this could lead to a simple genetic test to prove purity, leading to recognition and status for excluded ponies,” she says. They are hoping that a supplementary register can be created alongside the current stud book.

For now, this sounds highly unlikely. “We are the Breed Society and have been guardians of the breed for over 100 years,” points out Hill. “There is no impasse as there’s no mandate amongst members and trustees for a supplementary register.”

He adds: “It’s not good enough to suggest that a pony that looks like an Exmoor should be allowed in the studbook. If a Dartmoor pony is dropped onto Exmoor – and all sorts of horses and ponies have been abandoned there over the years – it could breed with an Exmoor. The resulting foal could look like an Exmoor in every way but its genetics will be mixed-breed.”

Moreover, established divisions, he says, allow for uncertainty: Section 1 features pure bred ponies where sire and dam are known. Section X features the other ponies that have not met the breed standard, not been put forward for inspection or who are waiting re-inspection. 

No doubt everyone will have strong opinions about the rights and wrongs of this situation. In Lorna Doone, the star-crossed lovers unite in the end and peace breaks out in the valley.  Whether the Exmoor pony aficionados can reach the same accord remains to be seen.