I want to know

[nightflight]

Edited: Actually just the same as Jill and Marty when you get right down to it.

 

[Cathy_H]

They say no with not much of a reason

.. Before we sold our palomino we had several outside requests to breed to him.... My answer was no. Too much of a risk if/ when the mare owner is irresponsible.. I know lots of people who say they are responsible but I know in my book they are/were not.... We did breed our palomino to a couple of outside mares but only because I knew the owners well................. Try to get to know the stallions owner . If they feel you are a responsible horse owner & will take care of the mare properly then they may let you breed to him.

 

[Jill]

Okay so some have reasons but have you ever thought about the horses they might own. i have been to a few appy breeding farm websites and i see a nice stallion but I see mares that I belive dont fit them now can you explane that to me? If they love that stallion so much why are the mares not as fitting to there conformation and beauty?

Keep that up and you'll never make friends with the stallion owner. I'm pretty sure they are happy with their selection of mares and if their foals are costing "too much", they're probably not the only ones happy with how their stallion x their mares turns out. You are "owed" no explaination.

Plus, if I tell someone "no" and they press it -- it's going to be NO from now until the end of time and I'm going to let others know how annoyed I was and that they may want to avoid doing business with the person who has been pressing it. It really illustrates one big reason I don't stand stallions (I don't want to deal with the way many horse people are -- from the attitudes to the not handling their business right.) Think about it -- if you decide you do not want to do something and someone badgers you for reason, are you likely to change your mind? Or are you just more resolved to do what you want with YOUR horse or property?

Honestly, just the phrase "if they love that stallion so much..." is insulting. Who are you or anyone to quantify how much they care about their stallion? Or to question their selection of mares? Very insulting and I'm sorry, but even more so if you are youth questioning a breeder who has actual experience under their belt. Very disrespectful on several levels.

 

[Little Wee Horse Farm]

We bred miniatures for decades and only in the very beginning did we stand a stud to outside mares. The experience brought with it:

A mare kicking me square in the stomach when I tried to hand breed her. With both feet, mind you.

The owners of another mare deciding they wanted to take her home right after her heat was over, not letting her stay to see if she came into heat again. therefore, allowing a horse out of our facilities, then possibly having to assume she was still "clear" of anything infectious upon her return. They had no stallionat home to check her for coming back into heat. I told them I would not be responsible if she were not bred & that there would be no re-breeeding if she were not. It turns out they didn't want to pay the $1.50 per day boarding fee for the mare. Gees. But she did end up bred, so that's good. But....those 2 are just little examples of what can happen on the "stallion side of the family."

Those are just two incidents.

Please consider too, that you have responsibilities as the owner of the mare: vaccinations up date, culture taken, coggins test, boarding fee, booking fee, breeding fee etc. It's not as cut & dried as it may appear. You don't just put her in the truck & go. It can get very expensive & you'd need to adapt to whatever the stallion owner demanded.

For the stallion owner, there's also the possiblitiy that the mare might come back into heat. Most stallion owners contract that if an outside mare doesn't come up pregnant, she comes back for a re-breeding with no extra charge. Guess what that means? More work for the stallion owner without getting more money.

Your mare would also need to be checked to be breeding sound, in my book. Not that she wouldn't be, but before I'd invest my time/money in trying to get a mare bred, she'd have to be vet checked.

And it goes on & on for the stallion owner. There were people (and I'm not kidding) coming down my driveway about once a month asking to breed their mares to one of our appy stallions. No, no & no. For almost the whole time we were breeding horses -- if you wanted one of their babies, you had to buy one. One of our studs has produced a reserve world champion who is also reserve national champion, national Top 10 halter & national top 10 performance. Would I sell his bloodline for a few hundred bucks? Uh, no........

And then what about "live foal guarantee." ? That's a whole other issue.

See? It can get really complicated & we waded into the "standing at stud" thing & then decided, after a very few times..........never again.

I sound harsh, but it's not really said that way. Just trying to add a little experience of my own to the soup here. Good luck to you in your search..........there's nothing to say you won't find someone else who would be glad to sell the services of their gorgeous stud.

-- karen

 

[ChrystalPaths]

Well said ladies!

 

[Field-of-Dreams]

We had a mare in this year- for FIVE WEEKS! She NEVER cycled, never showed ANY signs, and was a holy terror to work with. We'd take a stallion out to tease her and she'd go ballistic- and she wasn't even near him. And there was NO way she was already bred, she is an "only child".

So at this point I would prefer no outside mares, myself....

Lucy

 

[shadowsmystictopaz]

keep things coming im starting to understand

 

[Sarah's Little Blessings]

I'm sorry you're having trouble but as a stallion owner, I understand "why" someone wouldn't want to stand to outside mares. I don't want to be responsible for taking care of someone else's mare. I don't want to deal with the way a lot of horse people seem to be. I have spent a lot of time and money selecting mares that I think will cross nicely to my stallions. If someone wants a foal by one of them, then maybe they can buy one from me. At this time, there's not any stud fee that would make it worth it to me to have other mares in here, regardless of how nice the mare may be.

DITTO!

 

[Jill]

Just try to imagine how you'd feel if the stallion was yours, and you had mares you picked out to own and breed to him. Think of how little a stud fee is (and to me, little includes 4 digit ones) compared to what the stallion owner has to put up with and the potential risks to their horses (injury, illness) and the inconvenience. When it comes to the horses here, there's just not a stud fee I can justify that would make it worth it to me. However, if someone truly admired my stallion (or one of the mares) and was a good home, I would give serious consideration to help them get a foal of their own.

 

[Little Wee Horse Farm]

keep things coming im starting to understand

My question, then, would be -- what else do you need to hear to get you to understand? I think we've been pretty inclusive. But if you don't understand by what's been said here, I don't think you'll get it. Sorry, that's the way I see it.

 

[mydaddysjag]

Also, by breeding to outside mares they decrease the value of their foals. I know that I will pay a lot more for a horse that has bloodlines hard to find. Not saying that I buy just on bloodlines, but when there are 2 foals of a bloodline versus 20 foals of a bloodline, your going to be paying more for the foal.

The less you have of something and the more people that want it the more you can charge for it. Im not sure if your old enough to remember, but a while back they had these toys called furbys. They came out right before christmas, and there were a limited supply. they were the hot item for a christmas gift that year, and there were parents sleeping outside stores, and people paying $200 for them. Its supply and demand. They want it, you have a limited amount, and if they really want it, they'll pay what you ask for it.

Also, when breeding to outside mares they have no control over what happens to the foal. Atleast when your selling the foals yourself you can try to get them into show homes etc.

 

[wpsellwood]

Myself would be concerned about foaling out the mare. I know we have camera pagers and have it on the internet. What about all the people that say "Look at the surprise I found this morning" sometimes they are up and fine and sometimes dead. Then for that big breeding fee I got I get to do it again. No thanks only to people I know, who watch as good or better then I.

 

[shadowsmystictopaz]

I think that everyone has there own opinion on things and I belive that AI is a great thing to do many mares could benifit from it.

 

[Jill]

Logistically, AI is very tricky with full size horses and I think even more so with minis.

The most ideal, perfect way to get a foal from a stallion you admire, is to watch and wait and look at the foals born in 2008 and offered for sale, and in 2009... eventually you may find just the right foal, the perfect color and the sex you want. All of which are up in the air when you try to make your own (which isn't even an option w/ this sire).

There are a few stallions I have admired for years and have been fortunate enough to pick daughters and sons from them and they're the colors I like, the type I like, etc. Plus, it is a lot of fun to anticipate picking out that foal

 

[heart k ranch]

I got my paint mare bred though AI a few years back.... They had the stud right there but they didn't want him to get hurt or her. So they AI, I think it took 4 months to get her stuck! I don't think I'll ever go though that again. They stopped charging mare care days because they did so many trys and I was getting mad!

I honeslty think AI is a great thing but for a mini! The tube they use for a normal size mare will have to be TINY for a mini.

I think your best bet would be buying a foal from this stud. Or looking else where.

I stand my studs but if I don't like the mares or I think they wouldn't cross good I wouldn't do it for a million! I'm with the others on this one....

 

[hobbyhorse23]

I am very carefully steering clear of this specific topic as I think you've already received very good (and patient!) answers and I am not a breeder myself. But the more I read the more it occurs to me...

...is this part of why we have so many backyard breeders in the miniature horse world??

Not only because miniature stallions are so much easier to manage than their larger counterparts but because very few stallions stand to outside mares so in effect almost everyone who wants to breed ends up having to purchase their own stallion? I'm not in any way critizing those breeders who for many good reasons do not want to offer their stud to outside mares, it just occurs to me that a side-effect of that practice being wide-spread is that people who might otherwise have sought to use a well-known stallion on their one or two mares as most big-horse breeders do now has to go to one he can purchase himself which, let's face it, is not likely to be as good as the one the professional breeder owned.

Just a thought cautiously offered up for discussion. I'm not saying I'm right or that there's anything wrong with that practice if I am!

I'm only curious what those with more experience than myself think.

Leia

 

[kaykay]

my neighbors do AI all the time. They told me about a famous miniature farm they used to AI for (before they moved) and they said they had fantastic results. He said the myth about it not working well in Miniatures is just that a myth. We were going to AI one of our stallions for a person out of the United States but the shipping plus the cost of AI was just too high. So mainly I think the cost is the biggest factor. But again I think in the future you will see more of it.

I know I got a call recently from a man in California and he was so upset because no one will AI ponies or stud their stallions out. I explained to him all the reasons stallion owners dont like to stud out but he said its just crazy as they are used to how things are done in big horses.

I totally understand both sides of the debate. But I do think this contributes to there being so many intact stallions

 

[rabbitsfizz]

AI as backup to natural service is a doddle in Minis- I have been party to AI in Arabs and it was a right royal pain- timing the collection, sending it courier, getting the Vet etc etc and this was just from Holland to us!!!

Not for me, I'd rather take the mare to Holland!

Is horse semen freezable yet or are we still dealing with chilled??

If so the life is limited.

 

[love_casper]

AI as backup to natural service is a doddle in Minis- I have been party to AI in Arabs and it was a right royal pain- timing the collection, sending it courier, getting the Vet etc etc and this was just from Holland to us!!!

Not for me, I'd rather take the mare to Holland!

Is horse semen freezable yet or are we still dealing with chilled??

If so the life is limited.

I read an article recently that it's now freezable. I'll have to find it, somewhere in my mess of a closet.

Interesting duscussion.

 

[justagirl]

AI as backup to natural service is a doddle in Minis- I have been party to AI in Arabs and it was a right royal pain- timing the collection, sending it courier, getting the Vet etc etc and this was just from Holland to us!!!

Not for me, I'd rather take the mare to Holland!

Is horse semen freezable yet or are we still dealing with chilled??

If so the life is limited.

I read an article recently that it's now freezable. I'll have to find it, somewhere in my mess of a closet.

Interesting duscussion.

We've been doing AI on our cattle for years.

The semen can be kept for many many years in a specially designed liquid nitrogen tank.