Conception Rates vs Live Foals. stud fees are payable when?

[foxtale]

Most people tend to blame the stallion, when there is a small percentage of live foals. I think we should be looking elsewhere... it is not the stallions fault when the proper vaccines are not given and unattended births result in a lost foal.
A lot of the blame should go to the JC since the JC only counts live foals... I think a better way to do it is by conception rate.

Another thing that bothers me about the TB industry is "Fee due and payable when Live Foal Stands and Nurses" for the same reason I've stated above.

I understand not all farms follow this policy, but just try to do it otherwise here in PA !!!

In Argentina, they collect the stud fees at 60 to 90 days in foal!

When we bred QHs, the mare owners paid the stud fee before the mare left the farm or before the semen was shipped and were offered a breed back or rebreed to the stallion if she did not carry a live foal.

I am also wary of mares bred numbers... do you think some farms may add mythical mares to make numbers look good the first year or so?

A lot of folks will judge the 'future success' of a stallion by how many mares are booked. Of course this is an ODDS game and the higher number of foals should mean more success at the track, however, I don't think this necessarily means so .... outside of KY.

[LB]

I am also wary of mares bred numbers... do you think some farms may add mythical mares to make numbers look good the first year or so?

How would that make a stallion look good? I'm assuming that none of those mythical mares would succeed in getting in-foal--which would only lower the stallion's live foal percentage and make his fertility appear suspect.

Stallion owners want big books so that lots of offspring get to the track, get there early, and hopefully win. Mythical offspring do them no good at all.

[griff]

The avearge stud fee for the top five stallions is $110k

Forget that only about have the mares bred ever deliver a live foal and consider that only half the live foals ever start a race// That means the avearge fee paid to get a "top five" foal to start is $220k

Now consider thet fact that approximately half the starters ever win a race.. This is approximately the average for the top five.. Now the average fee cost to get a winner, from the top five stallions is $440k ; i.e., one out of four top five foals ever win a race, not one out of four ever win a nig race but 1 out of 4 top five get ever win any race.

Breed-to-race people, including me, must be insane to play whith these odds.

griff

[foxtale]

LB...
I didn't say it would make the [b]stallion[/b] look good, I said it would make the numbers look good for the first year. Most people , when considering a stallion, only look at numbers of mares bred, and on a second year stallion, this is the only statistic that is available. It will encourage more mare owners to want to breed to the stallion the following year, if they think he was received well and had a large book....

[Busanda]

I think LB is right though. If a farm has to lie about the number of mares a stallion has seen, then it's obvious the stallion isn't being well-received and there's probably an obvious reason for that.

I can see why maybe a regional market might be more susceptible to something like this, but if conception rates are low, due to natural reasons or "phantom" mares in Kentucky, that word will spread fast and due more harm than good.

It's all about getting the numbers on the track. People with legitimate stallions who bring good credentials to stud, will find willing breeders. It's the stallion owners who over-appraise their horse or who stand stallions that are missing key credentials that find it difficult to secure mares and then by extension, may try to get "creative".

And in my opinion, the stands and nurses payment date is great. It leaves a peace of mind with the breeder. The truth is, if stallion owners, especially in regional markets, were more selective about the mares they let their stallions breed to, there would be less people trying to haggle a free riding horse out of the equation.

When you breed to mares of no substance, the likelihood of getting a race horse is minimal and you have to think the owner of the mare probably knows this as well and is either a big dreamer or has ulterior motives for the foal.

And by the way, I was speaking in generalities in case anyone here finds my wording offensive.

[griff]

Busanda

Would you recommend breeding a mare with a 1/0/0;/0 even though both it's sire and dam are stakes horses?/

griff

[LB]

Most people , when considering a stallion, only look at numbers of mares bred, and on a second year stallion, this is the only statistic that is available.

You're kidding me, right? You think mare owners choose the stallions they're going to bred to by the size of the stallions' books??

Race record, conformation, pedigree...I guess all that is immaterial and we're really just a bunch of lemmings looking around to see what other people did so we can do it too.

[DDT]

griff

I do not know where your figures for the top five stallions by fee are coming from, but in the last ten years, sires such as A.P. Indy, Storm Cat, Gone West, Broad Brush, Distorted Humor and Elusive Quality have averaged well over 70% live foals, unless the data contained in the Jockey Club is in error. While it is true that the average for the breed, as a whole, for starters to foals and winners to foals is about 50%, the average for the top sires by stud fee is around 65% for starters and a little better than 50% for winners.

Still, these numbers make it hard to understand why anyone would try to beat these averages.

DDT

[griff]

I looked at the top five 2008 sallions as listed in Blood Horse. added their fees up and divided by 5. That came out to be $110k

I am probably off the mark a bit with the average % of live foals that ever race as I was using a number I research several years ago.. However, I have a hard time beleiving the avearge from the top five are much better than that.. I'll look into that and get back with you

As for the the % winners from starters you can find that with the list of top stallions and I seem to remember it was in the 50s.

I admit $440k is not the real number for the what was actuall paid paid in stud fees for number of winners from thise five stallions but I am confidemt it's between $300k and $450k for those top five.

And the avearge earnings per starter from those top five stallions in 2008 was not all that impressive. I think it was around $40 w/Curlin and around $35k w/o Curlin

griff

[foxtale]

LB...
Believe it or not, that has been my experience. I field about 20 calls a day and the first or second question I am asked is..."HOW MANY DID HE BREED LAST YEAR"! I am only speaking on my experiences.
1/2 of the clients who book mares, have NEVER been to my farm to see the stallions! As far as race record and pedigree, that is something they can see in a book. Soooo, when life gives you lemmings....

Busandra...
I do not condone it, but it is being done here in PA, and I agree totally , that it will only hurt the stallion in the long run. I'll say it again, a better way to count is by conception rate!
Also, how are stallion owners going to know what conditions the mare is going home to? How selective can we be when the average stallion in PA bred 13.9 mares in 2008? The numbers are not high as it is, so again, this is a regional market problem.

[LB]

Soooo, when life gives you lemmings....

Thanks for the laugh, foxtale. I guess breeders must be very different in PA than they are in KY.

[DDT]

griff

I want to be clear here, what I was asking about was your reference to half the mares deliver a live foal, this is not true for the top sires. I looked at the top 2008 sires in question, Smart Strike, Giant's Causeway, Tiznow, Distorted Humor and Elusive Quality from the Bloodhorse and for the last 5 year period all of these sires averaged at least 80% live foals except for Tiznow who had an average of 72%. You also used this figure on the AI thread, and I just want to know where that figure comes from.

DDT

[cng]

Stallions should be questioned for conception rates. A stallion with any number of veneral infections can pass on those infections causing early embryonic death. It is much more likely with thoroughbreds because of the live cover rule. Younger mares might fight off the infections but older mares and ones that have had histories of infections will be more likely to abort.

I once stood a QH running champion who had better than an 80% conception rate (proven by ultrasound) but only about a 50% live foal rate. The horse got covered up by rebreds and one of the biggest breeding farms in the country didn't want to stand him any more because of the rebreeds. We started treating the semen with antibiotics and radically improved the live foal rate. Something that cannot be done with thoroughbreds. Another factor to allow AI.

Breeding farms want clean cultures before breeding your mare but would BALK big time if the mare owner wanted to see a stallion culture including a semen culture.

[griff]

DDT

I went back and read my original post and it went somethink; "Forget that only about 50% of covered mares deliver a live foal"

I did NOT do a study on the live foal vs covered mares on the top five stallions but did come up with that overall "about" 50% covered mares deliver a live foal a couple of years ago... And, that's one of the reasons I said "Forget" that only 50% of covered mares deliver a live foal..

The other reason I said FORGET is people out side of KY don't pay a fee unless they get a "Stand & Nurse" live foal and even in KY you get a rebreed . There for the % of live foals ber bred mares are not important in the "stud fee cost per winner" analysis"..

How about the other data I used.. Is it "approximately" correct after you "forget" the % live foal to covered mare part??

I stand by my "stud fee cost per winner" data for the top five stallion ias in the the ball park. And I also stand by my contention that the avearge earnings per starter for these top five stallion is really not that much better than the better regional stallions and is a much better measure of a stallions worth than total earning from 200 to 300 starters.

griff

[DDT]

griff

I am not looking to bust your stones on this, I agree that there are many regional sires that have good numbers all around, but, the average earnings per starter can be misleading in many ways especially if the stallion has one or two high earners as opposed to the overall earnings of his other starters and in my opinion a median earnings figure is much better.

One statistic that tends to reflect quality is stakes winners to foals and stakes winners to starters.

Regional breeders are only faced with a decision to use a top 10 high fee stallion when their mare warrants such a venture, if you owned a GR1 winning mare, or a GR1 producing mare how could you justify breeding her to a regional sire simply because you are saving a bundle on the stud fee?

DDT