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The worst reasons for breeding your mare.

9K views 73 replies 40 participants last post by  Southern Grace 
#1 ·
Background to the thread:

A response to a question I asked on Facebook this morning.

Rules for joining in:

This is a generalized thread, NOT I repeat NOT intended to be personal, but a collection of thoughts in one place.

OK, my beautiful Emmy, who I posted about on a local trainers board this morning.

I have a gorgeous arab mare, well started a few years back under English saddle, but has had a couple of years off. She is highly reactive, read scaredy cat, but is getting better as we work together on the ground. I would like to start her again western, and am debating the pros and cons of sending her out to be restarted, or working with her myself with a trainers help.

I think it may be better for us to keep building our relationship, but am only to well aware if my shortcomings as a rider. IF I do decide to send her out it would need to be the right person, this girl is basically kind and willing, and I wouldn't want her to be pressured in the wrong way.

Talk to me of trainers that may help her start again and get confidence in herself, or the pros and cons of her and I working with someone to get confidence in each other.
one of the responses I got included this.

Also there is ******* My current full time working student that's amazing as well but has her hands full with ours right now.
Trying to get *****https://www.facebook.com/connie.kuipers.7 Out here!
Then we can take on more

Also has this mare had a foal, cause this can really settle down mares.
My bolding.

I did have to point out, that while I would love to have a foal from her, and I already have a stud picked out for her, the fact that I have a youngster already, and don't need another means that I don't want to breed her for a keeper foal. I also can't see that she has much to add to the current market, I would rather breed her IF she achieves something than just as a way to possibly calm her down.

Oh, and I can 60 days under saddle for her just for the cost of the stud fee, without all the other costs involved. :wink:

What others get to you?
 
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#2 · (Edited)
Lol, years ago I had a moody, sometimes perfect, sometimes witchy, maiden mare. At shows, I would either walk away with High Point or nothing, depended on her mood. I bred her and her mood swings stopped but only when she was pregnant, and of course I only showed her in the first few months of her being bred, after the foal was weaned, she went back to being her moody old self. So that reason would be not a permanent cure!
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#4 ·
"I want a foal for my kid to grow up with." That will make their bond so super duper speshul and they'll love each other forever :wink:.

Or, "I want a piece of my mare before she gets too old". Yep, because every baby is a carbon copy of their mother LOL. I've also noticed that most the folks who "just want a piece of their beloved mare" own a mare that is nice enough...but nothing really spectacular....in any way.
 
#5 ·
I think if a person has a full intention on breeding a horse, and picks the stud on nothing but color because you want X color foal, that's poor decision making. I mean, don't get me wrong, go ahead an have your preferred color! But take everything into account BEFORE the color. It's perfectly reasonable to want a blue roan stud, and to look around for a great stud with great confo in the color you want - but to just look for any Blue Roans and find the one that looks the best color wise so you can have your pretty colored baby... Not very wise to me.

As a side note - I can see this thread potentially becoming very heated, despite your warnings. Let's keep it civil, people. :)

Also, I just noticed the thread is "Worst reasons for breeding you mare," and I answered "Worst reasons for breeding." My bad. It kind of still applies... But I can't delete my post so it will stay here!
 
#6 ·
Whoa, what a crazy reason to settle down a horse, lol. Josie actually went from miss sweet and innocent to miss bratty cathy when she had her foal. She was good as long as he was with her, but when you rode off without him, it'd stress her out. Since then, shes had more of an apt to bond to a horse and look for said horse when we ride off alone, lol, so I'd say she didn't really settle down at all!

Is such a statement even valid? I've had so few bred mares, I can't make that judgement. Josie did change a bit in her personality sometimes throughout her pregnancy, she is still the same horse after giving birth as she was before.

****, I just can't believe someone would say something like that! Forget training, lets breed her to calm her down!! xD
 
#7 ·
Some people do that... there was this nasty mare that they bred just to get her to calm down rather than face her aggressive issues. She'd kick people without any real indication of a warning.

I was very stern with her and she NEVER struck out at me. And I'm the only one that could get her to trot/move out. She was very lazy and sluggish with others. I'm pretty sure it was her being stubborn...

She did mellow out after having a baby...for a bit. Then she went back to kicking people, biting people, and refusing to move out. Except for me ;)
 
#8 ·
i hate when people breed their horse because it is unrideable, whether it be crazy or broken down from bad conformation. its one thing if they were in an accident and got injured that way, but mystery lameness and bad confo/feet is a huge NO !
 
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#10 ·
The one that bothers me most is "I just want to keep a piece of my mare because I love her sooooo much." Nevermind she's a conformational train wreck, or is a who knows what/hasn't been tested. To those I silently ask "What if you lose the mare you love so much and end up with a pita orphan goal that you can't give away?".

Or untrained, unsound mares. Well she went lame let's turn her into a baby factory. Never understood that one at all.
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#11 ·
How bout just cus a foal would be SO darn cute to have around the place!

Cus said foal is going to not grow, not need to be educated and def won't cost any money. Not to mention it will just remain adorably cute in the paddock while it frolics around in the long grass.
 
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#12 ·
Oh-oh!!

I just remembered one that was actually seen here on the forum a few years ago.

People wanted to breed their mare because they felt she needed to "have a job". Never mind that she was lame for some unknown reason or that they couldn't ride her without risking serious bodily injury...or that she was a rescue with unknown bloodlines....and she had less than stellar confo.
 
#17 ·
A while ago I was talking to a friend about being so afraid of losing my mare. And how I was thinking about looking up her 3 foals she had (before I owned her) to see what they're like. (Purely curiosity)One is a pali stud that's still in my hometown so it wouldn't be hard..


My friend proceeded to tell me that I should just breed her again....really now.

A. She's 21....I WILL NOT breed an older mare EVER AGAIN. Period.

B. She does nor have the best Confo anyways.

C. There is NO market now so I could more than likely byy either of her babies or an offspring of the stud for much cheaper/ much LESS stress and heartache.

D. I was just talk if about being sad when I lose her and her immediate answer is BREED HER.....it flustered me to say the least.
 
#18 ·
If I buy my own stud pony for $300 and breed him to my friends' ponies for $500 each, I can breed him to my own mares for free and sell the foals for $500 each and make a ton of money! I won't worry about shots or feed increases or vitamins or ultrasounds or any of that silly stuff, because horses have had babies in the wild for hundreds of years.

Heck, why don't I buy two stud ponies? Double the profit!
 
#19 ·
I think the worst reason for breeding, is..

People who keep mares/fillies, with whole colts/stallions, because they are too lazy to separate them or have too many horses to separate.

Or..

People who keep a colt with his dam after 6/7 months old, because "He wouldn't breed his mother, would he?"

Lizzie
 
#24 ·
Last year I watched a guy leave his mares out on a fescue pasture and when time came for them to foal not a single mare had a drop of milk. They were never vetted etc. Seven of the foals died only a couple days after being born. He bred for color. I have never seen such beautiful foals hit the ground. Because the mares didnt come into milk he just said "they will once the foals start trying to nurse". Despite all our efforts he didnt listen to us or anyone else and didnt try to bottle raise them. he just let them go. All for color....:-( He let seven foals die. Seven foals within a month of each other. He wanted color, he got it but he never did right by the mares and then never tried to help after the births. Just, sad....its disgusting. All for nothing. Just wanted to make some money off some color. Sheesh.....
 
#25 ·
i agree with the people who breed a mare(or stallion) because she's no good for anything else.
If the horse has:
1)a mystery or conformation related lameness
2)a terrible temperment
3)mental deficiencies
4)a huge conformational defect affecting functionality

it should not be bred. PERIOD.

Yes, that means the mare thats perma lame for no diagnosable reason, the miserable b**** that has the "beware of horse" sign on her corral gate, the loopy mare you've always suspected of being a few bricks short of a full load and the hammer headed, splay footed, roach backed nag are banished from the breeding shed. Not even the award winning stallion down the road can save those genetics.
 
#26 ·
Worst reason ever. I challange you to find one worse than this.

"Horsies are endangered species! There aren't enough of them! There are plenty of people that want them, so let's just breed them untill there is a horse for every home!"

(This is the same person who bashed me for wanted to raise my own meat animals. Looked me straight in the eye and said "Support the factory farms.)

And yes, she is blond.
 
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