BERLIN/LANZHOU, Feb. 25 (Xinhua) -- As February draws to a close, early Spring approaching in Berlin, but winter is not yet ready to let go. The wind is still cold, and patches of snow refuse to melt.
In the Przewalski's horse area at the Tierpark Berlin, the ground is a sheet of white. In the center stands a haystack, and around it a dozen or so Przewalski's horses, a sandy-brown color against the snow, lower their heads to eat. They bury their noses deep in the hay, and the warm breath they exhale settles back onto their manes, turning into fine frost.
Przewalski's horse, the world's only remaining wild horse species, has an evolutionary history spanning over 60 million years. "They really like leaves," Martin Kraenzlin, curator of mammals at the park, told Xinhua. A keeper pushes a cart slowly across the snow, stops at the edge of the herd and adds bundle after bundle of hay, fresh branches, and even a Christmas tree.
Feeding Przewalski's horses is much simpler than feeding domesticated horses, Kraenzlin said. In winter, the animals are given hay and pelleted feed and in summer, fresh grass is added. Hay is available around the clock.
Meanwhile, order within the herd follows rules as old as the species itself. "In the wild, a typical group consists of one stallion and several mares," Kraenzlin explained. "But in Tierpark Berlin, where the herd is mare-dominated, the dominant animal is usually the oldest or strongest mare and that role can shift over the course of a year or when new individuals join."
It is hard to imagine that these calm, unhurried animals once nearly disappeared from the wild. Native to the Junggar Basin in China's Xinjiang and parts of Mongolia, the species is listed as a national first-class protected animal in China and remains endangered globally.
To bring the wild horse back has become a shared mission across borders. In 1985, China launched a program to reintroduce Przewalski's horses from overseas, and established breeding bases in Xinjiang and northwest China's Gansu Province.
In the late 1980s, the Endangered Animal Protection Center in Gansu introduced 18 founder animals from countries including Germany and the United States.
"From the beginning, we followed a phased approach aimed at rebuilding wild populations," said Wang Hongjun, a wildlife manager at the center. The population was divided into multiple smaller groups to build a solid breeding stock, laying the foundation for sustained population growth.
To strengthen that foundation, the center worked intensively on details. "By upgrading facilities, tightening day-to-day monitoring, and improving feed and nutrition across breeding seasons, while adjusting herd structure to maintain genetic diversity, we have strengthened our overall capacity for breeding and conservation," Wang explained.
Kraenzlin said China has done "outstanding work not only in breeding, but also in monitoring and winter feeding. That is especially important in the early stage of reintroduction, as cold winters and limited food mean a newly established population needs stable support."
One by one, the horses were brought back to their native range. They weathered winter after winter, and the population expanded steadily. In 2025, official data showed that the population of Przewalski's horses in China has surpassed 900, accounting for one-third of the global total.
"China's experience proves that large animals like Przewalski's horse can be successfully returned to the wild," Kraenzlin said.
Nevertheless, expanding the population remains a long-term task. "Today, wild populations are mainly found in China and Mongolia, but they are still relatively small," he said.
Alongside hunting and habitat loss, brutal winters have also historically been a key factor in the species' decline.
"Small populations are far less resilient to extreme winters than large ones," Kraenzlin said. "Countries therefore need to further cooperate in areas including introducing more individuals to bolster existing herds and promoting genetic exchange between them, to ensure continued population growth." ■
