Dwarf vs size

[MountainMeadows]

John, I also would like to thank you for your willingness to discuss this topic - the information gained will be so valuable to our industry.

I was just wondering - given that your family has had literally thousands of foals born over the years, DID you find that the foals from the "tinies" had more predisposition to dwarfism? Is there a height bracket that your family feels is the "cut-off" point - knowing full well that even if the horse is over the cut off point that it MIGHT still produce a dwarf, but the likelihood is far less.

Thank you,

Stacy

 

[Arion Mgmt]

Ok,

If you read my reply to Frank on the forum, I talked a lot about this. I do not have a "cut-off" I do not know what it would be or even how you could calculate that statisically, knowing that height is a quantitative trait, irregardless of the effect of the recessive gene, if any. Again what we all talk about is all highly subjective with height and being a carrier. Especially since I see tall minis with normal heads produce type 3 dwarfs.

King Supreme never produced a dwarf, statistically, he has a 99.99+% chance of NOT being a carrier.

Double Destiny never has either and it is even higher than that a 99.999+%, of not being a carrier. This is because I have bred him to known carrier mares of different pedigrees and inbred him into his pedigree a lot, and bred him to a daughter.

I know of overs, well over that have had a dwarf bred to a smaller carrier, so it really would be impossible to have a tall cutoff point given the fact that there could be a homozygous normal 25" (non-carrier) horse out there somewhere.

The only thing I do know is that I have yet to hear of a pure bred Shetland pony or Hackney any type of dwarf, especially not anything that looks like what we see in the Minis.

John