The Exmoor Pony is one of the oldest and most genetically distinct equine lineages on earth – shaped by millennia of wild living, rather than human selection, into an animal whose resilience is written into its DNA.

Despite their name, these ponies are not indigenous to Exmoor, but are an ancient type whose ancestors ranged across the whole of Britain and beyond long before any county boundaries existed. A remnant population did survive on Exmoor into modern times – enough to give the type its name and provide the foundation stock from which today’s herds descend – but the Exmoor Pony belongs to no single place.

Today, fewer Exmoor Ponies remain than giant pandas, placing them among the most endangered large mammals in the world. As natural grazers shaped by wild landscapes rather than agricultural ones, they are also among the most ecologically valuable – their hardiness and grazing behaviour making them uniquely suited to the rough, varied terrain of rewilding projects across Britain and Europe, where domestic livestock might struggle or fail.

The herd at Bamff belongs to Deborah Davy, whose life’s work has been dedicated to understanding and preserving what makes Exmoor Ponies irreplaceable. Davy’s research has shown that genetic diversity, not simply numbers, is the key to the Exmoors’ survival; a small, inbred herd is no safeguard at all. It is that insight which has shaped the Bamff herd into what it is today: the most genetically diverse herd of Exmoor Ponies anywhere in the world, free-roaming across the rewilded landscape.

Below is a complete record of every Exmoor pony that has been part of the Bamff herd – their parentage, lineage, and the family connections. Continuously kept up to date.

To view the register full screen, go here.