When the work began there were no reserve bloodlines, only one stallion, Chaar Suluu, and a handful of mares. Munarbek Kuldanbaev explains a life given to the Chaar, and what the next generation of stallions brings.

In the 2nd century BCE, Emperor Wu of the Han sent missions west in search of horses said to sweat blood. The association looks at those horses, the petroglyphs of southern Kyrgyzstan, and what they may say about the Chaar.

Summer pastures in the Tien Shan sit as high as 3,800 metres, reached by narrow, stony paths over the passes. This field note looks at the hooves, winter coat and ambling jorgo gait that suit the Chaar to that ground.

Spotted horses run through Kyrgyz folklore and the Manas epic, and through heavy losses under the tsars and the Soviets. Munarbek Kuldanbaev traces the Chaar’s past and makes the case for preserving the breed.

In nomadic Kyrgyz families, a household’s wellbeing depended on its livestock and on women’s skill in processing and preserving what the herd produced. This short piece looks at the independence and standing that nomadic life gave Kyrgyz women.

This field note looks at the Chaar’s place in the mountain grasslands of Kyrgyzstan, at what crossbreeding has done to the local horse, and at why protecting the breed matters for the land as well as for the herd.