Minis and Queen Victoria

[rabbitsfizz]

I don't claim to know everything, never did.Just know the facts

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[Colagirl]

:no:

http://www.falabella.co.uk/falabella.html

 

[kaykay]

I will say this. there is a lot of erroneous information about Falabella's just like there are about how miniature horses came out. People like to create a mystique by telling stories such as the falabella stories of small horses being cut off in a canyon etc. Makes a great story but really thats all it is-a great story

I think the stories are fun as long as you dont take them literally. Remember these are businesses that were creating a market for what they produced and certainly having entertaining stories full of mystique helped sell them. Audrey Barrett had told many people that she exported quite a few horses to the Falabella family *arenosa horses

 

[Shari]

Yes, this is what I have found out too. Not as romantic but I like it a whole lot better than fairy tales.

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There is nothing wrong with wonderful Shetland ponies!

Oh Deary, Deary me!!

In the (adopted ) land of the Shetland Pony, why on earth would Queen Victoria have Miniature horses to pull a carriage??

Anyhoo, I think someone got their wires crossed a little bit there.

The "mine ponies" so often dragged out in these theories- in all countries concerned, are Shetland Ponies, nothing more, nothing less.

Original, real, native, Shetland Ponies.

Miniature Horses, all breeds, all types, from all countries, are bred from Shetland Ponies.

Falabellas are bred form Shetland Ponies.

There is NO way that you would ever be able to breed down any breed of horse without using the only breed of equine to be this small, ie The Shetland Pony.

I am sorry if I sound a bit lunatic about this but, honestly, I did think I had heard it all!!!

Patrick Newell was the first "Falabella" breeder- he was, in fact Irish.

It was his daughter that married into the Falabella family and the rest is history.

 

[Sue_C.]

Where did the appaloosa colour come from, I wonder? As there are no appy colours allowed in the Shetland breed, where is it coming from? I had always been told that the Falabella is the main origin on this colouration in miniatures...is it true...or not?

 

[Tony]

Where did the appaloosa colour come from, I wonder? As there are no appy colours allowed in the Shetland breed, where is it coming from? I had always been told that the Falabella is the main origin on this colouration in miniatures...is it true...or not?

I can tell you where that happened. My family raised Shetlands from the early 1940s and my mother always wanted an appaloosa Shetland, but they did NOT exist. Finally in 1956 the Pony of America (POA) was started, crossing Appaloosas with Shetlands. And in a few years of selectively breeding, voila, appaloosas in miniature! Most of them in the early 90s were 34-36" when I started trying to find some, but now, I have them in the 26" - 30" sizes...

 

[Sue_C.]

Thanks Tony!! I can't imagine why I didn't think of something like that...being an "appaloosa person", myself...

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Actually, it didn't take long to down-size them did it? Makes me wonder if there isn't more validity to the Horse X shetland than we're getting here, on this post so far.

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[rabbitsfizz]

Over here we have HUNDREDS of beautiful "Miniature Appaloosas" only we call them Spotted Ponies.

The breed (it is obviously not a breed but a pattern but none the less...) originated in Holland and is not nearly as refined as the Miniature Horse- but I have seen some outstanding ponies.

A lot are also "B" sized, but none the less really lovely.

I suggest that you look in your pedigrees for "Wantsley" among others, is where the spots came from.

Look at Orion Light- out of a Dutch Shetland mare, and comes up spotted with sire unknown.

So, it is easy to trace the origins of spots.

Most patterns are present in Shetlands- all patterns and colours are accepted except spots.

There is no Frame Overo in native Shetlands but I am assuming that came from the American Shetland- where they got it from I do not know!!!

As far as I can see everything except Frame and spots are there in Native Shetlands, ready to use.

Appy was definitely there in Falabellas right form the start- the original pony stallion that started it all was an Appy, by all accounts, and used as a riding pony for the children before the breeding started.

 

[Songcatcher]

A simple fact of color genetics is that you have a 50/50 chance of passing on a color pattern like Appaloosa or Pinto. Thus, you could cross a pony (of any breed) with a full size Appaloosa and have a 50% chance of getting the App pattern. Take a patterned horse from that cross and use for breeding, and you still have a 50% chance of getting the App pattern while the resulting foal would only be 25% App as a breed (if you consider App a breed). Thus, you can get successively 1/2, 3/4, 7/8, 15/16, etc pony and still get the App coloring by culling out the solid colors and continuing to use the patterned horses for breeding.

In other words, if you can separate the concept of Appaloosa as a breed from Appaloosa as a color, the breed dilutes by crossbreeding while the color has a 50/50 chance of full color or no color each time the cross is made.

Hope that made sense.

 

[Sue_C.]

A simple fact of color genetics...

I do understand the colour genetics, but was wondering just what pony/horse combo that we downsized so quickly from... I wasn't thinking POA's; as there are none around here, and it is a breed that I know little about, so the breed just didn't occur to me. It truely makes sense that they would have been the perfect choice to cross with the shetlands, as they were already downsized themselves, already.

if you consider App a breed

And I most certainly do, as it is.

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[rabbitsfizz]

As I said, I really do think the "appy" has come form the Spotted Ponies- Wantsley being the one that springs to mind- that were exported in the 80's and 90's.

Obviously Tony knows his own bloodlines and may well not have used these ponies but a number of them were sent out- around 100- so there was no need at all to use even large ponies let alone full sized horses.

I have done this "breeding down" thing and it works brilliantly for one generation then it slows down and the size may or may not reduce in the generation after that, and so on.

I believe the Oz people used pretty small Welsh, and also of course the Australian Pony which is predominantly Welsh /Shetland that was used as well. Very nice animals, though.

I wonder Oz people- did anyone keep records of the sizes of the mares and the full grown sizes of their offspring???

 

[Sue_C.]

As I said, I really do think the "appy" has come form the Spotted Ponies- Wantsley being the one that springs to mind- that were exported in the 80's and 90's.Obviously Tony knows his own bloodlines and may well not have used these ponies but a number of them were sent out- around 100- so there was no need at all to use even large ponies let alone full sized horses.

And I agree that many of these minis that carry appy characteristics may very well go back to those 100 or so ponies, but they'd of had to of been pretty busy lil guys to have done it all; :lol:

: when you consider the size of the area of North America the mini appys are found in now. Besides that, many of the appy minis I know of here, have bloodlines that go back much further than the 80-90's with the appy characteristics already there...

Wantsley, I have never heard of, does anyone know where he went to, or have horses that go back to him? It is really too bad that so many of our horses have unknowns in their pedigrees, because of the shetland and other bloodlines not being acceptable/wanted at the time. Because of this...we will never KNOW...all we can do is make educated guesses.

It really isn't much of a stretch to consider that larger ponies bred to other, smaller ponies, could produce mini apps, that hold their size...especially after 40 years or more, of selective breeding.

 

[joylee123]

Wantsley was the name of the breeder i believe. The only one I recall readily is Wantsleys Sarsem. I believe Joan Solheim in AZ owned him? And if I remember right he was appy.

 

[Songcatcher]

Wantsley was the name of the breeder i believe. The only one I recall readily is Wantsleys Sarsem. I believe Joan Solheim in AZ owned him? And if I remember right he was appy.

Just looked up on the AMHA Studbook, Mrs. Elizabeth Seymour of Wantsley Stud is listed as the breeder of most of the horses with the Wantsley prefix. There are a total of 12 horses on the AMHA Studbook with that prefix. Six Solid, four App, one Pinto, and one Roan. Of course, I'm sure there were likely others that were not registered with AMHA.

 

[victoria]

have done this "breeding down" thing and it works brilliantly for one generation then it slows down and the size may or may not reduce in the generation after that, and so on.

The same could be said for many breedings, I have seen many a small horse of all reg US parentage whith miles of small pedigree behind constantly produce larger than itself, then the offpring has gone on to produce large too. We certainly have not seen a huge variation here, Our orginal broodmare has had 11 foals to date, 6 were colts who have not been bred from and gelded, One filly died, one is only 2 this year, one has not been bred from yet but will be in the future, the 2 that have been bred both around 33.3/4 have consistantly produced smaller than themselves when bred to a varity of stallions and their female offspring have also produced reduced or same as their dam's in height which is not too bad considering the orignal broodmare was 37.5" and they are all remaining well under 34". However not really an issue for NZ as we are not obsessed with reduceing height and have a stong cat b contingant. I know of other instances of this with other breeders who used the welshies available with the same results including the national supreme winners maternal half sister who is now producing.

I believe the Oz people used pretty small Welsh, and also of course the Australian Pony which is predominantly Welsh /Shetland that was used as well. Very nice animals, though.

I wonder Oz people- did anyone keep records of the sizes of the mares and the full grown sizes of their offspring???

Speaking from some from the persepective of a neighbour I would DOUBT the Australian Pony breed was used extensively, it is fairly tall in comparison to the well established sheltand pony who had been their for along time and had a stud book of its own already, this would be the obvious choice for breeders wanting to knock the height down. I understand there were SOME breeders who used welsh, but I the pedigrees we have here from AU are Aussie shetland x US imports alot being Bluff View Domingo x with Happy Appy Daughters or vice versa. NZ had a lot of imports from Au in the early - mid 90's they were marketed as minis most of them were jet black and very sheltland looking and lacking refinement (Im not saying this is the case now so this is not NZ vrs AU just an ovservation from the early days, we have both come a long way but also gone in slightly different directions), this was because we had very few small indiginous pony's here, We saw many differences with the early imports so much so that some in NZ coined a term and Aussie muzzle, meaning a bulky muzzle from and Aussie Imp that was differcult to bred out once you had it. The early horses from both courntys looked quite different and i imagaine they still do have subtle differences...

 

[rabbitsfizz]

Oh, Victoria if you only know how much I campaigned for a Sec "B" here as well- we do have an "overheight" appendix but who wants a horse they cannot show??

And in harness, of course, the larger animals excel.

But, no, not allowed!!

Madness :no:

All those beautiful animals just thrown away for a couple of inches.

 

[victoria]

Oh, Victoria if you only know how much I campaigned for a Sec "B" here as well- we do have an "overheight" appendix but who wants a horse they cannot show??

And in harness, of course, the larger animals excel.

But, no, not allowed!!

Madness :no:

All those beautiful animals just thrown away for a couple of inches.

What a shame you were not able to secure Cat B's. The support we get in B classes is huge. I must admit it hasn't always been that way. When we first got into minis the A's far out numbered the B's now its equal or more b's at shows usually and this is the catogory that seems be growing the most. We used to have foundation also in the early years but our registry has been closed (asides hardshipping - and imports from approved registry) since about 97 - 98 being the last lot of foals registered from the DM or SR breedings, so the foundation horses are recorded in our stud book but no longer qualifies for registration.

 

[Lewella]

There is no Frame Overo in native Shetlands but I am assuming that came from the American Shetland- where they got it from I do not know!!!

Frame has only been in the American Shetland for the last 25 years or so. I haven't researched when it was introduced to American Miniatures but I strongly suspect it was introduced into both breeds at around the same time.

Section A Welsh influenced the American Shetland a great deal more than ever appears on paper.

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[rabbitsfizz]

So where- ie which breed- did Frame come from?? I have often wondered. There is no Frame in Welsh, Native Shetland , was it snuck in under the door from the Falabella- did Falabella have Frame then- do they have it now, I know they have Splash- so.....where??

 

[Songcatcher]

I am not claiming to be an authority on when or where the Frame gene came from to Shetlands and Miniatures, but just for a reference point, that may help jog others memory and help track it, Rowdy (born 1973) carried the Frame gene. So, that is now 33 years ago.