Another Breeding Question...

[severnmiles]

Seeing as there has been a bit a of chat about breeding vs value e.t.c

Personally don't care about bloodlines, end product matters more to me, if you went on bloodlines well where would you start? There are many extremely well bred horses but half of them are yacks!

So how important do you value the dam? Would you pay double for a horse out of a 4* mare or a G.P Jumper than you would a horse out of a nice enough mare? Even if both were very similar in potential/conformation/temp/ability e.t.c

 

[tigers_eye]

It helps, but it's not the be all and end all. I was impressed that Liberty's mum was Intermediate, but it wasn't why I bought him. Having said that if Headly Britania has any foals I'd be happy to have them

. I do think it's important to know the mare's breeding, so that the compatability of the stallion can be assessed. This only goes (for me) for youngsters though, once a horse has started performing in its own right I'd judge it on its own merits.

 

[ElleJS]

I think the mare is V important, and how ever good the sire is I always make sure they are out of proven/good mares.

I have a filly out of a 4* event mare and proven event sire so I hope that is the case!

 

[sw123]

Difficult one, i agree with ElleJS but we have 2 fabulous youngsters out of our mare who has excellent jumping lines and had good attitude to work but never competed due to an accident. If she'd been as good as her bloodlines then yes she'd have been well proven but we'll never know! However the babies look great.

Would rather go for proven mare but the bloodlines help as breeding throws back to grandparents too and if its a real common mare out of some "common" breeding much as that has been talented it may well throw back to the (for example) cart horse dad and cob mum and end up with not a lot!!

 

[ElleJS]

I agree, I think unproven well bred mare is a good bet as like you said it can throw back to the grandparents, one of my horse this is the case, and you can really tell he inherited the warmblood part from his dam's dam.

 

[henryhorn]

I wouldn't actually breed out of a mare unless I knew it had a history of being good in competition or had a lineage that had produced good horses.
No matter how nice it looked I would like to know it's sire at least.
Some bloodlines produce horses that have special attributes, for example ask anyone on this forum if they have a Cruising related horse and I bet they all say they are bolder than average jumpers!
Provided the immediate relatives had good records I would use an untried mare, but either it's siblings or it's parents would have to have done or produced something half decent...
Talking about it the other day, we decied the only way to ensure success breeding is to be large scale; you need fifty mares of decent breeding put to similar stallions, that way the majority would eventually end up as good horses. Doing it our way with five mares is more a hobby! (and an expensive one)

 

[Partoow]

I think the mare is more important than the stallion and she should be graded and/or have a performance record of some type.preferably she should have a full lineage as any off -spring will be the product of 4 grand parents not just 2 parents and understanding this will help in the stallion selection and give a clue as to the foals potential. The mare in temperament terms,however has a lot to do with how the foal veiws the world through learnt behaviour and a good calm open disposition is very imortant. That then leads us into the maelstrom of issues with embryo transfer .What influence does the surrogate mare have on the genetically superior foal???
Some mares are amazing in their ability to produce good offspring to a variety of stallions, there is a mare at Bert Ruttens in Holland that they call the 'Golden Goose' because of her stunning array of successfull offspring with great regularity. The dam of my graded stallion was a 1.60m jumping horse who was then retired to stud at 10yrs she produced two graded sons and a 'ster pref' daughter , who herself has gone onto produce successful sport horses. So breeding from proven mares for me helps reduce the odds in what is afterall a lottery.

 

[druid]

[ QUOTE ]
Some bloodlines produce horses that have special attributes, for example ask anyone on this forum if they have a Cruising related horse and I bet they all say they are bolder than average jumpers!

[/ QUOTE ]

"Brave to the poitn of stupidity" was my trainers phrase

and handy with their (impressive) bucks, more stubborn than any other horse I've meet..shall I go on?

Fabulous, fabulous sire though - would have another like a shot!

 

[viola]

I would give the same importance to the choice of a mare as to the choice of a stallion.

 

[severnmiles]

[ QUOTE ]
I would give the same importance to the choice of a mare as to the choice of a stallion.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'd give more importance of mare over stallion but what about a proven mare against an unproven mare? Do you think its progeny has more chance of excelling and therefore worth more?

 

[viola]

If the mare was unproven and young (less than 4 years old) I would then look at her pedigree and base my decision on:
1) Her own pedigree
2) Her indication of competition promise (loose jumping, movement, attitude to ground work)
3) Her conformation, temperament and overall impression;

If all the above would be to my satisfaction and she would match my stallion I would not hesitate to choose her.
If the mare was unproven, older and of unknown quality I would not consider her a prospect for breeding <u>a competition</u> horse.

In the ideal situation though (i.e. money no object) I would always go for proven mares (not necessairly on the top level but at least graded and showing competition value when ridden).