URUMQI, June 4 (Xinhua) -- Seven Przewalski's horses have been sent from northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region for a journey over a thousand miles to the east for mating.
The horses, two males and five females, are from Xinjiang Wild Horse Breeding and Research Center, the largest wild horse center in Asia.
On Sunday, the horses started off to a wild life center in Gansu Province to help the horses to improve their genetic quality, the center said. Due to lack of foreign breeds, inbreeding has been quite a problem at the Gansu center.
Before the 19th century, Przewalski's horses lived on grasslands that are now part of China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region and Mongolia. The species faced extinction after over-hunting from the early 19th Century.
The breed was reintroduced to Xinjiang and Gansu Province from stock captive-bred in Europe in the late 1980s, two decades after its extinction in the country.
By June, the Xinjiang center has bred 613 horses. Over 170 horses have been released to the wild and live on their own.
