By Sarah Friday Peters 



T 



he phone rings in the old 

 keeper's quarters under the early morn- 

 ing shadow of the Corolla Lighthouse, 

 and Rowena Dorman bounds from her 

 chair to answer it. 



"They just called me," says 

 Dorman, director of the Corolla Wild 

 Horse Fund, taking her seat again. 

 "There 're three studs down in Sander- 

 ling. We've been taking those horses 

 back [north] for the last six weeks. They 

 won't stay because they've found green 

 grass down there. We're going to have 

 to do something with those boys." 



Sure enough, a chestnut stallion 

 and two walnut-brown studs feed 

 calmly a few miles south on N.C. 12, 

 oblivious to passing cars and a tourist 

 snapping pictures two feet away. 



THE PROBLEM BEGINS 

 WITH THE INABILITY 

 TO PINPOINT THE EXACT 



ORIGIN OF THESE 

 MUCH-HERALDED HORSES. 

 CLAIMS OF PURE SPANISH 

 ANCESTRY FUEL THE FIGHT 

 TO PROTECT THE HORSES 

 AND TO ALLOW THEM 

 TO RUN WILD. 



For five years, Dorman and other 

 members of the Corolla Wild Horse 

 Fund have been trying to figure out 

 what to do with "those boys" and the 

 rest of the herd that roam Corolla's back 

 yards and roadways. Until 1989, the 

 horses ran freely through the salt 

 marshes and dune swales of Currituck 

 County, like some believe they had for 

 400 years. But development and a 

 northward extension of N.C. 12 

 changed that. 



The problem repeats itself many 

 times down the 175-mile stretch of bar- 

 rier islands from the Virginia line to 



Continued 



COASTWATCH 3 



