Genetic question (SUBJECTIVE)

[Tappiano]

Generic genetic question... no opinions are wrong.

Example....
If you cross a stallion and a mare who are very different in size you get one or the other not something in between.

So,
If you have a stallion with a longer back and cross it to a mare with a shorter back does the same apply? Is the length of the back tied directly to the length of ALL the bones, ie, long legs? Or, can one have lots of leg bone but lack in spine?

[cng]

Since there are no wrong answers, you should breed like types. One of the primary mistakes in breeding racehorses is trying to correct flaws of one parent with the other (small to big, long to short, muscle to lean, crooked to straight, etc.). Balance, symmetric proportions and a hell of a lot of luck are necessary to breed a racehorse. When you get into “engineering” with crossing body types to “correct”, what you usually wind up with is a clumsy individual that can’t get out of it’s own way. You could possibly get by doing this with dogs or food livestock but not racehorses. You shouldn’t be breeding individuals with conformational flaws to anything. 98% of all horses didn’t meet these criteria to be bred.
This only reinforces my thinking that racehorses are freaks, otherwise breeding the best to the best would always result in a racehorse. We all know that this isn’t the case so we breed the best to the best and hope for that freak.
I guess you could say if we are breeding for freaks – what does it matter? To which I would say you didn’t have nearly enough to drink last night and don’t confuse this with clear thinking.

[madelyn]

I have seen some pretty awful specimens in the Warmblood and Cob category when folks have tried big mares with little ponies, fine built TB's with big draft or cart horses, etc. One mare stands out in my mind - she ended up 15.2h tall, with a very narrow chest, wide hips, a big highset neck, ordinary bone on her legs and these MASSIVE irregular feet from her sire, who was a Shire. I believe breeding to try to improve the specimen one has is sort of wrong. You should just start with a good specimen. The differences between the mare and the stallion should, in my opinion, be kind of subtle.

[LB]

Genes don't average out. They bring to the table what they are. So if you breed a horse with a long back to one with a short back, your chances of getting a medium length back are pretty poor since neither parent brought that to the equation (at least not in a physically apparent way.)

As for size, that really depends. A 13.2 Welsh Pony who has come from generations of like-size ponies is likely to produce a similar size. A 13.2 Welsh/TB cross (product of a 12.0 sire and a 15.0 dam) gives you all sorts of possibilities in what she might produce since her genes are a mix of several different sizes.

In TBs, a small mare doesn't always equal small offspring nor does a large mare mean that she will necessarily produce big.

[Tappiano]

Thank you for responding.

I was asking because there are some sons of Silver Deputy with the longer backs and some without and wondered if those sons would be more likely to have one kind versus the other.

[xfactor fan]

The problem with breeding the Best to the Best and hope for the best, is that there is no standard to define best.

Good racehorses come in lots of different sizes, shapes, and distance abilities.

Both Secretariat, and Northern Dancer were great racehorses, but very different in body type.

Free advice worth exactly what you paid for it:

Take a good hard look at your mare, and her sire. Find the stallion that is the same body type, the best racehorse, and in your price range. Or take a look at the broodmare sire, and go for a horse that matches his body type.

Was your mare a success at the track?


Any my favorite odd looking horse was the result of a really nice quarterhorse mare pastured with a huge Shire-Clydesdale-who knows what stallion. Sire was huge and hairy. Colt was a beautiful quarterhorse from the knees up. From the knees down he was all draft. Huge hooves, and lots of hair.

[Jorge]

I have observed that the role of INCOMPLETE DOMINANCE in practically every genetic trait is far more common or prevalent than many people may be aware to perceive.

This situation because, let's say that the color of a foal coming from gray and bay parents sports the black lower leg markings of his gray parent but with the rest of the body color coming from the bay parent. A non-inquisitive observer may think that the bay parent won the whole set, while the truth is that both parents splitted the combo. This may be happening in many instances across the whole genetic panorama of this foal unbeknowst to the owner of the foal and parents ---and to all of us!

I think the same thing applies much more frequently to other morphological genetic characteristics than we may be aware. Why not?

[Tappiano]

I did not have any ulterior motives in asking my question. People might have had experience to draw upon. I can talk pedigrees with anyone but I don't have experience with conformation so the only way I am ever going to learn is to ask. If I wanted to know because of my mare I would have said it. She has a date planned for next year provided she does not go too late.

And yes, it is up to me to decide whether the free advice has value but that does not mean I should not ask?

[zinn21]

From my studies and somewhat limited experience confirmation/physical attributes seems to be all over the map. Some stallions stamp their foals who look physically similar no matter what type of mare they bred. Same goes for some mares. Then you have everything else in between where physical influence varies. Until a mare drops a few foals it's all theory. After a few foals it's damn near all theory...

[xfactor fan]

Asking is the only way to learn. Good for you.

I always put in the disclaimer when giving advice.

What's the name of the mare if you don't mind sharing?

[Tappiano]

We are not talking about any particular mare, just a group of stallions by the same sire.

Kodiak Kowboy is a son of Posse who is a son of Silver Deputy.

They have a length of back that is different than two other sons of Silver Deputy, Spring at Last and Badge of Silver. Could we say that because Posse passed that back on to KK and he was a good runner too that he might be more inclined to pass that on?

Now I do have a mare (I thought the entire board knew and has gotten tired of hearing about her) but I would not breed her to anything under 16 hands that has a long back; but that's because her family has consistently thrown tons of bone and I would be afraid of all that leg on a small and long frame. Another G is over 16.2. She has a small bag now and is due in four weeks with her first foal. Nobiz (who she's in foal to on the free season I won) is about her height and similar frame but she has more leg. Even though she's a maiden I think we are expecting a nice sized foal.

[xfactor fan]

Long backs and short legs may not be all that bad, depending on why the leg is short.

You might want to look at the ratio between upper and lower leg. The horse may looks short because the knee to hoof distance is shorter that the knee to elbow. In other words a very long forearm. Take a quick look at Secretariat.

On the other hand sometimes the genetic dice give you a large body horse on tiny legs.

[Tappiano]

Here are pictures....

Forget if you know who they are for a minute...





And then there's this one who's kind of short....but unrelated.



This is what 16.2-16.3 and lots of leg is to me.

[Dave C]

I bred a long backed, short legged sprinting mare to a stallion of the same type and got a tall lanky distance loving filly. Breeding type to type is not a guarantee that the foal will be that type. When I looked at the physical types of the strongest genetic influences for the filly, I discovered that I had inadvertently strongly linebred to the opposite physical type of the parents.

[Mahubah]

As far as correcting conformation in a foal goes, what I have always heard is that if your mare has a weakness -- say, she is a little too long-backed but is otherwise a nice, reasonably correct, well-balanced animal -- you select a mate for her that is fairly similar in type but is correct in the area in which the mare is weak. Pairing opposite faults (a mare that is too long-backed with a sire that is too short-backed) doesn't average out in most cases, and mating highly dissimilar types doesn't usually work too well either, as other posters have already noted.

Hirsch Jacobs once said that he believed a major factor in Stymie's talent and durability was his superior balance -- none of his points were weak and none were exceptional, but they all fitted together perfectly. Not a bad ideal to shoot for.