Breeding Theory: Mutliple Mating Theory

[bdw0617]

most mares don't have 5 foals, i would think that is skewed data if there is even any.

Why do you think that?

because they don't.

go though and pick 500 random mares and see the avg amount of foals they have.

Even if it is over 5, let's say 6-7, it is still not a very useful pecie of information, what you are really still asking is, is the dam a stakes winning mare. that information is not useful ureally unless the avg amount of foals a mare produces is around 9-10

[Sysonby]

Not that I really want to get argumentative but "because they don't" really doesn't illuminate anything.

My guess is that you can take a poll of the breeders on this board as to how unusual it is for a mare to have 5 foals and they've all had mares that have done it. I have a mare that will be 8 next year who will deliver her third foal. God willing, she'll have her fifth when she's ten. Her dam is still active at 13 and she had her 6th this year. Her dam is still active at 19 and although she had a lot of fertility issues, she's had 6 foals. Another daughter of this mare had 5 foals and she died when she was 8.

If you said 10 foals, I'd agree that most mares don't get there, but a production of 5 or 6 isn't that unusual and actually it's pretty ordinary. Look at the Keeneland catalog of mares over 15 and I'd be surprised if most don't have 5 on the ground unless they had either a tremendously late start or fertility problems.

[Rokeby Forever]

Well I always look also at how well or poorly a mare was mated. Using the example of two of my mares, Believe It Shesdue and Miss Ballet, both mares were poorly mated for the first several foals. Believe It Shesdue doesn't really have anything going, pedigreewise, with Strike the Gold or Stephen Got Even (although one of those could jump up and improve the page). Miss Ballet couldn't do the impossible and produce a good horse by Private School or Waving Past. This is an area where I think statistics might not really be applicable, unless you restricted a study to mares who had five foals (or more) in succession and were well mated.

I think that's a great point!

In the commercial market, nicks don't mean as much as what kind of foal can sell well. That being the case, a broodmare might not be bred to sires that would compliment her as much as producing foals that would bring bucks at a sale.

But after some duds and a devaluation of the mare, she might actually wind up being bred to a lesser sire that does nick well with her - and the result could be a nice foal.

I think there was a time when broodmares had a short window of opportunity to produce a successful foal - back when breeders matched up mares and sires based on families, nicks, conformations, and everything else out of the textbook. But today, none of that applies - so I think that a broodmare today could produce her best offspring later in age once some breeder gets the sales mentality out of his/her head with a broodmare and actually tries to breed a good horse instead of a sales horse. Agree?

[bdw0617]

Sysonby, you are trying to make an arguement out of a subpoint. it's not worth arguing about. my only point being as a whole, is that even if you have more than 5 foals on ground, unless it's 10, it's not good enough data to form a poll that means anything. what good does it mean if you tell me that 80% of the stakes winning foals come from the first 5 and the avg mare produces 7 foals? not very much..

[TomFool]

OK, well lets do this just go through the Nov sale & select mares that have 7+ foals & just see the % that had thier only stakes horse or best money earner within their first three foals. I'm not stating that an older mare cannot have a nice foal but in a game of % & numbers this is a very obvious one to me.

[bdw0617]

OK, well lets do this just go through the Nov sale & select mares that have 7+ foals & just see the % that had thier only stakes horse or best money earner within their first three foals. I'm not stating that an older mare cannot have a nice foal but in a game of % & numbers this is a very obvious one to me.

it would take more than 7 from a matetmitcal standpoint to make any signifnace.. you would least at least 8, and then to make it a good solid arguement, make it the first 4 foals. so if more than 70% of stakes winners are from the first 4 foals, then you might be on to someting sysonby, I'm always open to learn something

[RandomThoughts]

The practice of "nicking" has been denounced and rebutted by the statisticians for years, and their logic is good mathematics. But in breeding or in business, you never have all the facts or often not even a good sample.
And the math folks can't explain how Tesio produced the best runner from 30 different sires, or how he won 20 Italian Derbys from 44 years when he was raising only 6 colts a year on average. Of course, along the way he bred Ribot and Nearco as well. But based on many readings of Tesio's book, I've concluded that Tesio nicked his matings.
Since I got re-involved in racing about 6 years ago, I have bred and raised 2 colts and 2 fillies of racing age from 2 mares. Three have won maiden specials with Beyers of at least 80, and one of these has run a close second in a Grade 1. The other has run second with a 74 Beyer so far, in her first start on the turf.
All are modestly bred by market standards. So in my opinion, nicking works or works more cost effectively than breeding a million dollar mare to a thirty million dollar stallion.

[bdw0617]

if someone were really, able to combine the two... the huge bankroll to bred with and the pedigree nicking knoweldge of a tesio.. there could be a racing dynasty.

people with money are too willing to just "throw money at it" and people who are broke, lol, are broke... they do good with what they have.

[madelyn]

OK, well lets do this just go through the Nov sale & select mares that have 7+ foals & just see the % that had thier only stakes horse or best money earner within their first three foals. I'm not stating that an older mare cannot have a nice foal but in a game of % & numbers this is a very obvious one to me.

Those are just the mares in the sales. Obviously the seller is "cashing in" on that early success.

Look also at the economic side. If a breeder has had 5 or 6 foals from a mare, it is very likely she is fully depreciated and offers no more tax benefit, so the breeder sells that mare. The breeder then buys another mare that can be depreciated. Provided he spends more on the mare he bought, what he gets for the mare he sells vanishes in the wash. There are a lot of mares in the "fully depreciated" category, who are 11-14 years old, and can offer the budget breeder a GREAT value.

Something else to consider is the fact that the market severely punishes a mare who has not had a foal every single year. But some mares aren't cut out for that. I, personally, prefer to leave first year mares open after that first foal because it can take so much out of them. If a foal is very big and pulls the mare down, leaving her open might result in a much better NEXT foal, since the mare has time to recover before she is pregnant again. So it depends on who was breeding the mare. Again, sometimes the mare who looks a bit "spotty" with a couple of years with "No Report" can offer great value.

[hpkingjr]

Seems like I remember reading (Avalyn??) that Bull Hancock did a study on his mares at Claiborne and used 14 years as the cut off on keeping the average mare (not that his were average). The chances of a stakes winner after 14 years was so much less that he turned his mares when they turned 14.

Now he didn't do this to all as every rule has an exception.

[GreenThumb]

A very good example of multiple matings is the horse below.

http://www.pedigreequery.com/musique+toujours

I talked to the owner cause I liked the musique denfer pedigree. He said he inbreed to blackball and went with a tail to cinq a sept as that was the female family of cure the blues.

He did the mating multiple times and came up with a winner from a stud that never did much

Chris

[bdw0617]

interesting, thanks for that


on that note, let me ask you this on the flip side. let's say you have a mare like Bedazzle. first time out couldn't have been more successful with street sense. do you keep going back to the well in the future or do you keep rotating around?

[louis finochio]

Great breeders became great breeders by listening to their Tb on which matings consistently produced those superior runners vs those that didnt.

Breeders that ignore those bloodline affinitys will breed many also rans.

[bdw0617]

Great breeders became great breeders by listening to their Tb on which matings consistently produced those superior runners vs those that didnt.

Breeders that ignore those bloodline affinitys will breed many also rans.

I don't necessary agree with that, because you are be default saying that if you stray outside of wht has already been done with the mares bloodlines, you will NOT get a runner which is not the case.

[louis finochio]

When a breeder goes against the % of successful unions and goes out on a limb of try out matings, he will be walking on thin ice.

A. B. Bull Hancock was a great Tb breeder, as his successful principals of breeding were, breed away from unsoundness & establish family nicking patterns. Amen Bull, well said.