Cost of breeding a foal??

[PuddingandElla]

Hi - I am thinking about putting my mare in foal next year. I have done some research but i am trying to work out the cost. I know it depends on lots of different things like stallion etc. But can anyone give me a realistic figure of what it might cost?
She will have to be AI'd and i have seen one stallion i like that says he costs £350 or i may use my vets stallion who is very nice.
Any ideas?? Thanks

 

[sillygillyhorse]

There was a very good artical in one of the horsey mags (possibly H&H) that outline everything, think they put the final figure from choosing the stallion to producing a just broken 4yr old at about £8,000. I know the breeder of my horse quoted a similar figure (I paid no where near that for him, and I mean no where near)

Personally I would prefer to let someone else do the breeding then I can go out and have my pick of the 3/4yo without the stress raising a foal can bring.

Try and find the article if you can it was very informative and left no stone unturned.

 

[Christmas_Kate]

I agree with mrs T.
The cost from before conception to 3/4 yrs old is ALOT, more than you would pay for a decent 4yo someone else had bred.
You also need to look into the reasons WHY you want to breed, is your mare well bred? Does she do her job well?
Also have you the facilities for a foal? A large stable for foaling, good turnout, etc etc.
I looked into getting a yearling, but at the end of it you pay the same costs as for keeping an older horse, for something that you can't ride for another 3/4 years.
There are vets costs, vaccinations, feeding mare and foal properly, dentists, more vets, etc etc....

 

[Tempi]

im putting my mare into foal next year and the 'year' before she actually foals ive put aside £2000 for.....frozen fee is £650 for mine, then theres the AI plus any other visits on top. luckily my yard is next to an official AI centre so i dont have large call out fees etc to worry about.

 

[miller]

A friend has bred a lovely filly by Medoc, she is AI trained so does that herself and she reckons the filly owes her around £2.5k at the moment

 

[severnmiles]

PG, what stallion are you using?

 

[_jetset_]

A lot...

 

[filly190]

I understand that it is wonderful to breed your own foal and can appreciate your reasons. Unfortunately there can be an awful lot of hidden costs and the other posters are giving you excellent advice.

I'll give you an example, I know a filly from the Newmarket Sales, her sire is Grand Lodge and his fee at the time was £100k. She went to the sales as a two year old, so image what she cost the breeder up until then. She fetched £7K because one of her front legs is slightly crooked and no one wanted her.

I know this is a rather strong example, but what I am getting at is the risk element. If funds are no object and thats what you want to do - go for it.

If funds are limited, think about it carefully, I have had two friends were it ended it disastor. The first friend, her foal got joint ill. The second friend, her dam broke her leg when foaling, she had to put the foal in her car, as it was life and death and drive 5 hours to find a serrgoate dam.

I dont mean to put a downer on this for you, I just think you need to budget for everything to go right and just in case it goes wrong.

I know your intentions are good and I am sure everyone will support you, if you go ahead. Take care

 

[MillionDollar]

A LOT!!!!!

Ok long one but heres my story so far-
Took WB mare and NF mare to be put in-foal to Slotshus Tosca £400 stud fee each.
WB mare did not get in-foal at all, don't know why.
NF mare got in-foal but to Goshka Ringo as Tosca got injured and could not get on to dummy mare, then reabsorbed, then didn't take then got in foal.
As WB mare did not get in-foal i took my other NF who i was going to put in-foal next year anyway, she got in-foal first time only for it to be twins, so one was pinched out.

Here are my costings so far-

Stud fee

£400.00 each = £800

Livery fees

£5.00 per day + VAT each = £587.50

Vet Fees

£201.70
£87.96
£148.36
£96.00 = £534.02

Transport fees

£40.00 per journey = £120.00

TOTAL so far = £2041.70 for 2 foals which aren't born yet!

Good thing though is i got a £650 stallion for £400 and they will be coloured foals!

It is VERY stressful and expensive but fingers crossed i'll have 2 healthy happy foals next year and it will be worth it!

 

[kalasadi]

Put aside 5k for the getting in foal and then the birth!

Your swabs need to be done for the mare-once they are clear then its all systems go!

The AI can fail if your vet is not a stud vet! Not forgetting the arrival of the equitainer with the semen in!!! Budget for 3 attempts.

I pressume you have your mare well rugged up and under lights at the moment so she will come into season early for next year? A lot of mares as still in season now due to it being mild.

Once your mare is in foal then you will need to start feeding her stud diet from about month 6-7 depending upon the mare.

Cost for cctv whether wireless or cable to your house. Cost to call vet out to check the birth if all goes well.

Buy in colostrum, bottles etc just incase of any problems.

Feed plenty, farrier, constant handling etc!

 

[squirtlysmum]

I bred my own baby and my god what a trial it's been, although I would never regret having him. I bred him so my beautiful and exceptional mare would carry on. I lost her last year and he is the absolute image of her.
I would estimate it has cost about £12k so far, so my god he better be a big star and win lots of money!!!!
I chose insemination, sadly then we had foot and mouth outbreak, so poor old vet had to do all scans at the yard which also happened to be on a Dairy Farm! She took first insemination and pregnancy went without a hitch, she then decided to hang onto him and foaled 23 days late, making me very grey haired. Oh yes don't waste money on a foal alarm it didn't work!
Now this is where the fun began! There are three vets to this story! (Old vet used before I moved, new vet and current vet.)
He was so weak I had to bottle feed him as he couldn't stand, the new vet was crap, to say the least, and didn't check anything so a few hours later my new foal had retained meconium and terrible colic, I rang new vet who told me, over the phone 'Well sounds like he'll die and has something wrong with him' he then refused to come out!!! Old vet then comes out from Maidstone (47 miles either way!)and six, yes six enemas later and 46 hours without sleep, for me, he finally pooed for England. Due to new vet not checking mare or foal, mare also then had retained placenta and got a big infection in her uterus, on the scan (with a very good new local vet!)you could see she was full of pus, this went on to cause laminitis and she wouldn't let the foal feed from her, so back to me and the bottle. OH yes he also had an umbilical hernia!
Everything seemed to settle and she and he were managed and weaned at six months.
At age two he was castrated and hernia fixed, in Nov had major colic surgery, at age three me and foal have to see mummy become terribly ill and eventually PTS, and at age four he's now diagnosed with a kissing spine, WHAT NEXT!
But don't let me put you off breeding your own, what fun!!!!!

 

[amandaco2]

think long and hard
my filly costed me about £6000 to breed from conception through to 6months old, and my mare didnt have any illness nor did the foal.she foaled at home (otherwise hat wuld have been an extra £7-800) and i delivered baby.
ive been really really lucky-mare mare ha bred a lovely foal with outstanding movement and temperment.and shes bay too!
i choose the stallion who suited her best very carefully, made sure he was graded and his foals were too and he threw foals out of the type of mare i have got consistantly! and whos stud fee was at thetop of what i could afford(ended up at about £1800 just to send her to stud, AI and bring her back again!)and she caught first time no problems at all.the stud fee is the least of your worries believe me!buy the best you can, although its by no means a qaruntee, esp if your mare is unknown breeding/never had one before.
i was risking my mares life, the foal could have died too in the worst case.so i had a significant risk of loosing the mare and the foal and spending all that money which i could have bought a nice youngster already backed for!
i did have an issue with the mare accepting the foal for the first 72 hours requiring someone to live in the stable 24 hours a day (we had laready been on foal watch for 10 days so exhausted doesnt even come close to coveriing it!) but we gotthere. its very common for first time mares to have issues like this with varying degrees of severity-some foals are orphaned!
think carefully- experience and lots of money are needed!
an average or below average foal will cost you the same to bring up as an exceptionally bred one.
the AI centre must a A* or it gets very expensive esp if you are buying semen by the straw.
get a breeding soundness exam done on your mare before sending her to stud/send her to stud early to increase her chances of concieving thats year.some mares cannot carry a foal-some have very poor quality uterus linings more common in older mares.
just do LOADS of research and be sure your mare is breed worthy-what has she achieved?is she of excellent quality and type?temperment is a big big issue-foals are highly ifluenced by mum MORE than dads genes.

 

[freckles22uk]

Hi Helen,
The stud fee for Freckles was £600,
the mare keep was £9 a day, and she had to go to the stud twice, both for 3 weeks, as the first time she absorbed.
Goodness knows how many scans, 5-6 I think, £30-40 each
Injections,
£50 for extra vitanins,
Straw for the stable (mine normaly live out)
Then when Harley was born he had leg problems, so the vet bills to make him right came to £1000

so he was an expensive foal, and now ive got to keep him 3 years till I back him, but he will never be sold, and hes worth every penny (or in my case Euros)

jenny

 

[littlemare]

My nest year foal cost me in total with stud fee, vets fees (she took ages to take and then had twins so then started again) total cost being £5000, hopefully next years will be cheaper as we will have our own stallion home.

 

[racingdemon]

a lot of money, and unfortunalty when it goes wrong it goes expensivly wrong,

e.g. buttons was only 6 months old when a fight/kick with another foal resulted in a broken leg = end of buttons, yes he was well insured but thats not the point,

sweetie, a cheap foal (her stud fee was only £700) but she was born with a crooked leg, as she was a super shaped foal (apart from that) we had her sent to leahurst to have it pinned etc, (about £1000) she died while she was there from a reaction to aneasthetic, as it was a birth defect the insurance didn't cover that, so an expensive exercise

so last year we spent thousands and have no foals, this year we only have 1 mare in foal & are hoping for a better year, but talking to a freind last week, NOTHING with the slightest inperfection is selling, meaning we need this foal to be as straight as a die to get any return, yes we breed for fun & will never make any money (unless we get very lucky or invest in a serious broodmare, but seeing as the top lot last week went for over 4million, i think e'll have to make do for a while

its great fun, heart breaking and financially ruinnous, but also addictive, the stallion book arrived last week & i have done nothing but drool since!!

 

[S_N]

WOW!! Reading this thread makes it all sound like a horror story!! Sounds like I have been exceptionally lucky, or is it that I looked around and found the best for the price? Was a natural service, therefore cut out a whole heap of costs! I could halve and then halve again what I have ben told H is worth and still make a profit - atm obviously!

 

[MillionDollar]

I think you had a lot of luck, i had nothing but bad luck! Im praying everything will go better from now on, I hope to god it does anyway.

 

[brighteyes]

Why not leave it to the experts and buy something already safely born? That way you have a good chance of not getting something with wonky legs or other undesireable traits, you will have no worries about your mare and her foaling and it will be one less foal on the market for 'anything' to happen to!

It is very tempting, but the world is already full of horses and I'm sure there's at least one out there who will be just perfect for you. It's even easier to find a youngster.

 

[Anastasia]

When it goes right it is wonderful, when it goes wrong it is terrible. Last year we could not have done anything better, 5 healthly foals, three of which got 1st Premiums from the KWPN judges, all were sold to fabulous homes. This year we lost 3 out of 4 foals and that was even with us being at the birth of them all!!! This year has definately been an awful year on the breeding front for us.

Sorry dont mean to put you off..........

 

[Faithkat]

Mine's in foal at the moment (due 15th April) and thus far ir has cost :

£450 - stud fee - (would have been more but I know the stud!)
£10 - prostaglandin injection
£180 - fresh semen procedure (stallion is there but they do a direct insemination rather than natural covering
£261 - stud livery
£68-50 - vet to crush twin foetus
£31-34 - autumn pregnancy check

Total so far, without taking into consideration keep costs etc for the mare = £1000.34

She is going back to the stud to foal so there will be stud livery (£35 grass) plus the foaling fee. There won't be much change out of £1500 by the time it's born.

It's one of the reasons I get so annoyed by people on here who think breeders are asking a lot when they ask £4-5k for an unbroken 4 year old - trust me, they're not making any money!!

 

[PuddingandElla]

God - so much advice. Thank you so much!! I will have to think seriously about it. I will let you know what i deciede. I do have limited funds and knowing my luck it will all go wrong!! But i would live her to have a foal too. Big decision eh!I think i will have to have along serious think about it. I do have good facilites etc and a lovely mare to breed from but what if it all goes wrong??...... i'll keep you posted!
Thanks again. Great advice. x