Breeding from mares, does it really calm their temprament?

Queenbee

Queenbee

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I have recently acquired a 'project' she is a lovely 14.3 welsh x appy,she is very eager to please and loving but a bit highly strung and insecure. She is slowly working on her insecurities, but as we have all the time in the world and i have a few very nice breeding options i may consider putting her into foal. I think it will could really be the making of her, everyone always says: 'put them into foal, it will really calm them down'

Is this true? What are your thoughts?
 
I have heard this said and when I bought my 3 year old last May she came off the lorry after a 4 hour jouney like a lamb and when I turned her out she just put her head down & ate, she didn't even have a trot around. I later found out she was in foal. Since she has had the foal she bronks round the field like a lunatic, so perhaps it is not a lasting effect !!
 
No. Mine was the duracell bunny before hand, and sometimes shes almost worse now - we call her Tigger on speed. She was like it all the way through her pregnancy too.

Shes not got a bad bone in her body though and is never malicious, shes just quick, sharp and a livewire.
 
oh well, we may still have a little one from her!! Like yours Crazy Mare she is a live wire but i really do think she is genuine and not malicious! I think it may help me to be working with her for this period unrushed as it were. And a friend has already said that she would have the baby!!
 
My filly from the livewire mare is as laid back as they come - she really doesn't care about the world.

Mine is only like that to ride though, shes quiet as a mouse from the ground.
 
The only reason to breed from a mare is because you want the foal or there is a market for the foal, & your mare has something to contribute. With peoples circumstances changing all the time I dont think I would bring a foal into an overpopulated market place just because it may calm her down. Working with her, bonding with her is more likely to have longer lasting results then relying on the hormone change of pregnancy.
 
I agree with magic104 and Crazymare my mare's temperament has been the reverse. Although bizarrely she was lovely to everyone except me before pregnancy during pregnancy she's horrible to everyone except me.

In fact she kicked the YO owner the other day and nearly went for her yesterday. I for once am getting cuddles, I fully expect her to go back to ignoring me after the foal is born
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NO!

I wouldn't breed a mare just to calm it down. I know from experience that they come out the other end just the same! Any apparent calming effect is probably due to the mare being 18 months older by the time the foal's weaned, and just down to her mentally maturing.
 
Yes it calms them down.................while they are fat and can't be arsed to move...lol...

Had 4 yr old mare few years ago, easy as pie to break, was good as gold to ride, then we realised she was in foal. Turned her away and when we weaned the foal and rode her again she was an absolute loony, and NEVER calmed down.
 
Well it might do, but my opinion would be not to just breed to calm your mare down. Think about whether you would want a foal regardless. What would you do with the foal? sell? bring on yourself etc etc.
 
Well, if it calms them down I hate to think what my arabian would be like when she isn't in foal
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Wired to the moon most likely.

She is extremely hyper after foaling, can't be let out for more than 20 minutes at a time for the first three days because she just runs, after that the foal isn't allowed more than 10' away from her without her throwing a paddy and telling the foal off. Her foals are more laid back than her but perhaps that is the QH mentality of the sires showing.

She is a very sweet mare, but I don't think being in foal, or with a foal at foot calms her.

On the other hand, my Paint mellows noticably, and that's quite difficult as she is already horizontally laid back.

I don't know that I'd put a mare in foal just to calm her down unless she is a good enough horse that you had planned to breed from her already.
 
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