HGG Community Forums

I breed for both. Most of my foundations are either PF or RS. Some of my stallions are B papered RS but I don't have any red papered foundation mares so I treat their foals the same as everyone else.

Foundation C/yellow
2gen B/Red
3gen A/blue
4gen I start making exception and will keep high level A's and blues
5gen Should start seeing stars and gold if I didn't get a few in 4th gen.

I'm on this topic as a learner, not advisor, but I agree with everything that has been said so far.

I think how many/how strict you are with your requirements should flux with how many horses of a generation you have though. Right now my first 3rd gen horses are being born, and I don't have very many, and almost none that are A papered, so I don't think it'd make sense for me to be a requirement. However after a few more seasons when in theory I should be getting dozens of foals then it should be a requirement.

I think of it more as a percentage than anything else. The top 10% of every foal crop. Or the top 80% of a foal crop. Or top 3% if you have tons of horses.

Also how much if an allowance do you want to make for a horse with gene that you don't have any others of? Like I have a 4G KP that is only B. Should I get rid of him?

I think a good point to bring up is how you started your herd as well. If you start from scratch and have been breeding for awhile you know how to start and what to except. If your starting your herd in the middle of someone else. Due to rare genes or other factors it can be a little more difficult and certainly calls for exceptions until you know what to expect from your breeding stock. I guess that's why I start all my herds from foundation because I like the control that gives me and I'm more than willing to wait.

I am incredibly strict with my stallions and pretty strict with my mares as well. But, I also have the resources to pasture breed everything, comparison test colts against multiple benchmarks, maintain a huge show herd and keep as many foals as I want.

In all of my lines except for my show lines (and now in a few cases in my appy spot size experimental herd), I strive to breed even generations and use the highest quality horses available to me in that generation as breeding stock.

What does that mean?

Well, it means in gen 2 I'm breeding from A colts, or B colts that test AGA my A colts. In gen 3 it means I'm breeding from Blue mares and Red mares right up until I have enough Blues to snip all of the Reds. In gen 4 I expect to start seeing *Stars and *Golds.

Not everyone can breed like that and that's fine. But if you're breeding even generations, please remember your mares have one foal a year. Your colts have up to 50, maybe even more if they have a full book and straw foals. Holding your stallions to the highest possible standard will have the greatest overall impact on your breeding program. Having high quality stallions will also help you weed out your lower quality mares because their foals will be more likely to be snipped...

Please also remember that if you are getting 1 or 2 superior to sire colts in a crop of foals, you're probably also only getting 1 or 2 superior fillies. If you are pasture breeding and you get a filly as your Best of Pasture email, that girl is golden for you. It's really hard to know who your top mares are until they've had 3 or 5 or 10 foals...let the game help you!

For those already breeding uneven lines, I would say anything C or Yellow and not a foundation probably isn't worth keeping in your breeding herd unless your goal is strictly show ponies. Even then, using red mares with a star stallion *should* produce higher PTs than yellow mares.

With your uneven lines, your goal should still be a steady march up the paper levels. If you've got a breeding pair that's breeding down consistently, not up, then something is wrong.

I do have a show line (Ice 1, Ice 8 and Nexus) and many of my breeding horses are horribly uneven. But my stallions are all As and I'm only keeping blue fillies intact to further the line. As soon as I have a Star colt I will start snipping the As. And in the mean time, I am building a nice little herd of high PT fantasy show ponies!