Would you believe we usually start discussing “next years” stallions on the way to or back from the vets with our mare that we’ve just covered for the following year ?! Yes it sounds absolutely crazy, but by the time we’ve assessed all the previous stock, worked out strengths and weaknesses of mares and stallions, and made short lists April of the current year … all winter and the following spring we need to allow time for these things!
Where do you start? The first question is what do you want to breed? Here at Chisum Lea Farm we want to breed an athlete; something that will take you right to the top, although we have a passion for Show Jumping we also breed some horses for Eventing too. Aside from using top class stallions, one very vital component for us here at Chisum Lea Farm is temperament. Why breed something that has all the talent in the world, but no one (or very few people) can ride it? Talking of riding; next is ride ability movement and confirmation.
Once you’ve got those ingredients in mind, we look to matching our mares. They’re the best we could buy at the time; with relations competing 1.40/1.50/1.60 level littered on both the dam and sire side. We are continuously looking to improve these lines, and have reinvested along the way to welcome a 1.50m show jumping mare to our herd. There’s an argument in itself; does a broodmare have to have competed to produce exceptional stock? Well… maybe that’s a different post for a different day!
Ok so you’ve got the foundations; now we look at assessing our mares. We must be critical…Assess your mares confirmation, temperament, and attitude. Does she lack blood, is she too hot or need cooled down?Is she rectangular or short, heavy or fine boned? Is she tall or small, is she athletic in walk, trot, and canter? No one is perfect (I’m sure we’d all change something about ourselves if we could) but we work with what we have. A good breeder will try and match their mare so that her weaknesses can be balanced with the stallions strengths to improve the stock. Don’t forget though paper is important too, does your mare have a strong dam line, are there commercial stallions in her breeding, what do they bring to the table, what stallions will also strengthen her foal on paper, as well as in the physical aspect.
Any breeder will tell you there is always an element of luck. You can have a full brother or sister that are completely different to the point you’re nearly ringing wetherbys for a paternity test. But over time you start to work out what suits your mare; and sometimes you’ll throw your hands in the air and go sod the stallion’s input “isn’t it just your mini me” !
A thought to leave you with; we had 4 super foals this year and in our opinion all 4 looked just like their dams albeit some in different colours but it reminds me of an old saying from many moons ago “75 per cent of the foal comes from the dam”. Perhaps 75 percent of the thought and money should be going into the mares rather than the stallions?