So, you've got a dwarf, now what do you do?

[StarRidgeAcres]

So, let me add to the dwarf hysteria, and yes, I think some of us are being a bit overboard, but that's ok. It's what makes this place interesting!

So, you look at your herd and you think, with your new and improved dwarf-seeking eyes, you see a dwarf. But you can't be sure. But the possibility it there. Do you notify the breeder and freak them out? What are the implications for the owner of the stallion? The owner of the mare? What about half-siblings? What if I have a dwarf born here next spring? Do I then start calling all the people who've bought horses from me in the past that are out of the sire/dam and say "just wanted you to know your perfect little horse may be a dwarf"?

I guess what I want to know, is if everything was in a perfect world (yeah, right!) and everything was done by the book, who all do you notify? Does this mean that if I have horses that are out of famous horse and then one of mine produces a dwarf that that famous horse is now at risk because one of it's grandget is a dwarf?

Where does it end? And what should be the responsibilities of the owner of the dwarf as far as notification to others?

Does the owner of the famous stallion really WANT to know about it?

Thoughts please!

 

[backwoodsnanny]

I think this is a very good question. We bought a mare in foal locally and when her baby was born it was a dwarf I did notify the previous owner and it was not received well. She simply did not want to hear it. I talked in length with our equine vet and his opinion was to try breeding the mare again with a different stallion so we gave the mare a yaar off and the following spring bred her to a different stallion the result? Our little Helen who is not a dwarf but was born with no eyes which the vet told us was a developmental defect. The mare is still here and will be until I can find a place where I would be confident would not breed her ever again. I would have her spayed if I could afford it. I posted to this because this was a small farm that had the stallion that created the dwarf and if they didnt want to know about it why would a big name farm that produces many babies a year. I am wondering too how many mares or stallions that have produced dwarves are sold with no indication to the new buyer that the animal is a dwarf producer?

 

[user 488]

Where does it end? And what should be the responsibilities of the owner of the dwarf as far as notification to others?

Does the owner of the famous stallion really WANT to know about it?

Thoughts please!

I am wondering too how many mares or stallions that have produced dwarves are sold with no indication to the new buyer that the animal is a dwarf producer?

I have not posted on any other dwarf thread. But your comments here hit home. Lets see......how do I put this.........because of my position monitoring this forum I do here a number of complaints on shoddy sales practices.

First of all you have to understand that many of the people breeding would not know they were breeding horses with these recessive traits. So a lot of this breeding would be chalked up to total ignorance. (mind you, ignorance and stupidity are two different things here)

BUT.......there are breeders out there that are breeding KNOWN dwarfs and dwarf producers and selling those offspring as breeding animals. NO they obviously do not tell the buyers this information. Would you telling them you think a horse that you have purchased has recessive traits do any good? Probably not. Because if they had a conscience to begin with they would never keep breeding these animals.

I recently ran across a website with horses that have produced dwarfs. I am sure they did not know that these horses who have been sold to them have produced dwarfs in the past.

This is what I take issue with. Ignorance is one thing. But people practicing this kind of underhanded, deceitful selling really kind of make me sick and they are doing nothing but perpetuating the problem.

So I think you will get a variety of answers here. Some people will want to know......some won't.........some won't care, etc.

 

[hhpminis]

I think this is something that each of us have to do in our own herd. Everyone has different opinions as we have seen here. For instance just the discussion on a "dished head" brought out that we have many different ideas of what we consider a dish.

Since dwarfism is still an unchartered course so to speak, in that we have not for sure found the source, i.e. genetic, mutation, environmental, or D all of the above. In its minimal expression, which I believe there is such a thing, that is a personal decision that each breeder has to make. I do not think we can pass blame on the person we bought the mare or stallion from or who 5 generations ago knowingly bred dwarves to reduce size, or whatever we think the case may be. That is all past history, what we need to concern ourselves with is what is in our barn right now.

Lets oversimplify this and say that dwarfism is nothing but a conformational flaw like any other that is an undesireable trait to carry on. Sometimes it is hard to determine the reason and we may try again. In my example, my mare had 4 pregnancies before I realized she was producing dwarf characteristics, 3 with me and 1 with a new owner in which she finally had a full blown dwarf. The first foal she had was lovely when born, only as she matured, and I am talking 4 yrs old the next time I saw her, did traits show that caused question in my mind. Then she had a late abortion, the foal appeared perfectly normal and quite lovely. The third was in pretty bad shape but after a couple weeks the deformities began to straighten out and my vet attributed it to environmental issues. This is a mare that showed well, even took supremes as several shows. Only after the fact could I look at her and see things that I had not seen before, it was mainly that her muzzle was quite big, could that have been a minimal expression of dwarfism? When she was bred the 4th time by another breeder, she was bred by a stallion that had produced dwarves in the past and had several characteristics that I considered undesireable. It was not the breeding of choice by the new owners either, it just sort of happened. It proved to be a mistake. I also divulged the history of this mare when I was approached about selling her to these new owners. When I went to this persons farm the following spring my heart sunk as the reality of my fears was evident in this poor little foal. Now this mare was out of my control and my hands were tied. They have carefully bred this mare and had foals by her and they appear to be fine and actually quite lovely. ????

I do not think this is a black and white science. I also believe that the buck lands and stops with our own programs. We learn from previous mistakes, we progress, hopefully, and breed better in the future. That should be the goal in any breeding program no matter what type of animal we are producing.

 

[MSRminis]

Since I have fallen prey to almost every horse selling scam out there I am surprised that I have not bought a "known dwarf producing" horse. I am sure some other unscrupulous seller will see me coming a mile away and I will have one in the future! I will say If I bred a horse or sold a horse and it produced a dwarf I would WANT to know from the new owners. I am sure many would not though. I would certainly notify the stallion owner or previous owners if I produced one also-what they did with that knowledge is something I can not control but I would sleep easy knowing I had fullfilled my obligation to pass on the information.

 

[Lisa-Ruff N Tuff Minis]

Well I can speak for myself.

I bought a mare bred to a Res national Halter Champion.. she produced a dwarf... The stallion was sold before his first foal crop hit the ground for a bit of money.

One my foal was born there were other foals born that year as well. I did tell the stallion owner(new owner) after some thought and some advice to do so and to not do so.

The decision was easy for me once I saw there was more then one in a limted foal crop. The owner of the stallion said I dont believe he was the real sire of these foals and continued to breed him (as well as produce dwarves)

I will say this was a foal crop of about I believe the number was 8 and 3 were dwarves no question about it the 4th was iffy very iffy in my book especially knowing about the other 3. Again I only owned one

now if I had a stallion that sired a dwarf to someone other then me would I want them to tell me YES as I might still be using him. Obviously if I sold the mare she would no longer be in my program so in that respect only it wouldnt matter to me but I would want to know.

Now all of that said like hhpminis said.. really call it a dwarf call it bad conformation call it a pet quality call it fugly - whatever you want to call it the question remains if you see the problem and call it whatever... why continue to breed it?(the problem not using it for the horse)

If it takes 2 then why wouldnt someone want to know they have at least one half of the equation

it would be like keeping a LWO horse a secret- some foals might be fine some not but wouldnt it save your clients and yourself alot of heart ache if you just simply said the horse is LWO positive

why cant the same be said/done for a horse who produced a dwarf if our best guess is that it takes 2 I am not sure why it would be a bit different

 

[Danielle_E.]

BUT.......there are breeders out there that are breeding KNOWN dwarfs and dwarf producers and selling those offspring as breeding animals. NO they obviously do not tell the buyers this information. Would you telling them you think a horse that you have purchased has recessive traits do any good? Probably not. Because if they had a conscience to begin with they would never keep breeding these animals.

I am not going to get into a debate re the above comment, it will just

things. There was another thread that was very educational and some breeders mentioned their stallion (in the past) and they did disclose to buyers.... and I find this particular breeder EXTREMELY ethical and forthright. I would do business with her any day more so than many others. I would rather know then end up with a bred mare who is supposedly bred to a certain stallion and you find out that is not the case at all and it's a stallion she does not own. I ended up giving the filly away. So please don't paint all breeders that have a stallion that has produced a dwarf in the past with one paint brush.

Also, in my studies dwarfism does can also happen because of environmental causes, at least that is what I have read. Of course the genetic kind more than likely happens more often but until they know for sure I can't say I blame someone for not jumping too quick to conclusions. I wish there was a test, it would make so much easier and wouldn't wipe out alot of the genetic pool. It wouldn't surprise me one bit if half of the miniatures are carriers. By removing them all we would probably giving up one evil for another with so much inbreeding.

 

[Kendra]

Also, in my studies dwarfism does can also happen because of environmental causes, at least that is what I have read.

What sort of environmental causes? I've heard people say, "environmental causes" but never anything more specific, and I'm curious.

 

[Miniv]

Since 1990 we have had one dwarf foal and YES, we informed the breeders of both the stallion and the dam.

And YES, we would appreciate knowing if any of our offspring were "part of the equation" of the produce of a dwarf foal.

Frankly, if a person is responsible for producing future foals and looking to continue improving the "breed", it should be to their benefit to know what their horses' offspring are producing.......don't you think?

MA

 

[Mona]

BUT.......there are breeders out there that are breeding KNOWN dwarfs and dwarf producers and selling those offspring as breeding animals. NO they obviously do not tell the buyers this information. Would you telling them you think a horse that you have purchased has recessive traits do any good? Probably not. Because if they had a conscience to begin with they would never keep breeding these animals.

Well Carol, I do take offense to this statement. Yes, I have had 2 dwarfs born here, both were bred by me. The foals were from 2 stallions, bred to the same mare. As I said in the other post, the mare was taken out of the breeding altogether and sold as a pet without papers, and the stallions I sold...neither because they had produced a dwarf, but because I decided on something new. In both cases, I told the new owners of each of these horses that the horse had produced a dwarf. It was never hidden nor kept a secret.

That said however, it was my personal choice to decide whether to continue to breed my stallions and mare, and I made the decisions. Yes, I will live with my decisions, and they were my personal decision but I can honestly say that by doing so, does not make me deceitful or without a conscience.

And no, I did not tell people buying offspring in all cases that the sire or dam previously produced a dwarf, although I would never hide or lie about the fact that is did, if I was asked. Until there is a test available, I will continue to do what I choose to do. It may hurt me, it may not, but in the end, it is my decision, and I am not being "blind" to the matter just because I handle operations on my breeding farm differently than others might.

 

[Danielle_E.]

Kendra, I will go and find what I read. There are many different types of dwarfism, not all are the same apparently and not all caused by genetics, or so I have read. Let me take a look and come back and post here.

 

[user 488]

Well, I guess I should have elaborated more. I was NOT talking about a stallion that has produced a dwarf or two. I am talking about stallions that have produced more than a few. And I am talking about breeders that I know and have talked at length with that have bred the same PAIRS over again and sold them as breeders. There are also others I don't know but have put two and two together. And even though you don't hide it I know some of these people have. So I guess I should have made that clearer.

I am not saying that just because your horse has produced one dwarf that it should be gelded or spayed.

As I have said before....far be it from me to tell anyone what to breed. What I think and how I would handle things has no bearing on how others will handle things. I do think it's a personal choice. But if I had a stallion who has had repeated dwarf foals I would choose not to breed them. I certainly would not continue to breed and hide the fact that he was a repeated dwarf producer. I just feel that it is underhanded.

And let me add this to the mix.........(edited)

What about the breeders who knowingly breed a stallion who they know good and well is a dwarf itself but yet they keep breeding and keep selling those foals? There is nothing about that which is anything but underhanded and deceitful.

So it is this kind of thing I am speaking of. Not the occasional dwarf foal born to a farm every now and then.

Now I also have to agree that there are definitely ENVIROMENTAL issues that also come into play. NO QUESTION.

BUT.......there are breeders out there that are breeding KNOWN dwarfs and dwarf producers and selling those offspring as breeding animals. NO they obviously do not tell the buyers this information. Would you telling them you think a horse that you have purchased has recessive traits do any good? Probably not. Because if they had a conscience to begin with they would never keep breeding these animals.

Well Carol, I do take offense to this statement. Yes, I have had 2 dwarfs born here, both were bred by me. The foals were from 2 stallions, bred to the same mare. As I said in the other post, the mare was taken out of the breeding altogether and sold as a pet without papers, and the stallions I sold...neither because they had produced a dwarf, but because I decided on something new. In both cases, I told the new owners of each of these horses that the horse had produced a dwarf. It was never hidden nor kept a secret.

That said however, it was my personal choice to decide whether to continue to breed my stallions and mare, and I made the decisions. Yes, I will live with my decisions, and they were my personal decision but I can honestly say that by doing so, does not make me deceitful or without a conscience.

And no, I did not tell people buying offspring in all cases that the sire or dam previously produced a dwarf, although I would never hide or lie about the fact that is did, if I was asked. Until there is a test available, I will continue to do what I choose to do. It may hurt me, it may not, but in the end, it is my decision, and I am not being "blind" to the matter just because I handle operations on my breeding farm differently than others might.

 

[backwoodsnanny]

In our case the mare who had the dwarf was bred again by us with our stallion and we were sooooo thrilled when Helen was born because she obviously was not a dwarf but then we discovered her defect the lack of eyes. My vet insists that the two are unrelated defects but we will not breed this mare again and though we could sell her we wont do that either for fear that someone else will. We will try to find her and Helen a forever home someday but we would never sell her without everyone knowing her history and if that means they will live here forever then so be it. Our dwarf could have been the first produced by this mare but somehow I dont think so. I think she had a dwarf in the past and that is why she was sold. This was NOT in the historical past this was within the last 5 years and as far as I know the stallion is still being used as a breeding stallion. I would never go back to this breeder because I think they knew when they sold this mare that she had had other defective foals.

 

[Danielle_E.]

Kendra, I will go and find what I read. There are many different types of dwarfism, not all are the same apparently and not all caused by genetics, or so I have read. Let me take a look and come back and post here.

Here is one link but not about environmental. I am looking for horse related (environmental)l

Dwarfism

Lots and lots of reading here about different types of dwarfism, etc.

http://www.use.hcn.com.au/subject.%60Dwarfism%60/home.html

 

[lvponies]

The bad thing is that there are those of us who don't know who is doing what behind their closed barn doors. I know it's the horse business and there have always been dishonest horse dealers in every breed, but I wish there was a way we could know who to avoid and who we could trust to buy horses from. I wish the truth was more widely known. No one wants to throw their hard earned money away buying a horse who's from a known dwarf producer or in foal to a known dwarf producer.

As to this topic......if a dwarf foal was born to a bred mare I bought, I would let the previous owners know. What they choose to do with that information is up to them. If a dwarf was born to a bred mare I sold, I would hope that that the new owners let me know.

 

[runamuk]

Also, in my studies dwarfism does can also happen because of environmental causes, at least that is what I have read.

What sort of environmental causes? I've heard people say, "environmental causes" but never anything more specific, and I'm curious.

Kendra some environmental things that cause defects are, high fever in the mare, certain antibiotics, some anti inflammatories, certain vaccines. Then there are things like pesticides, fertilizers, other chemicals. I know in humans certain dwarfisms seem to occur in older women.

Does anyone else ever watch the show Little People Big World? just wondering because in their case the parents are both dwarves and they have one normal sized son.

I would rather be told than have dwarves hidden, and I would rather deal with someone who is open and honest about it than someone who hides this information or convienently forgets to mention it

 

[Kendra]

Thanks for the info Danielle and Runamuk!!

This, I think, is the most interesting topic so far on dwarfism.

I want to know about all the foals anyone has from horses they bought from us, good or bad. I doubt everyone would feel the same.

 

[Marty]

I have some questions if someone would try to answer them:

1. Can someone please explain to me about the environmental issues?

2. Do you think overall height has bearing on dwarfism at all? In other words, does it seem like there are more dwarfs born to say 30" and under breeding or 34" and under breeding VS your taller B size minis? I'm wondering just how many dwarfs are born to say 34-36" minis in comparrison. Anyone have any clue?

And as far as the original topic at hand, my humble opinion is that if I had a dwarf born here, yes I would contact the former owner of the sire or dam to let them know about it. As a weenie and it would take guts for me to muster to do that, but I feel it's the right thing to do rather than to keep it underwraps so I should notify them with the information. Once they have it, then it's off my shoulders so-to-speak and they can do with that information what they please and I will take care of my end appropriately.

 

[Gypsygal]

I agree that a lot of the minis out there have the potential to have a dwarf. Some of the characteristics that we now consider to be "dwarfy" - were considerd 15-20 years ago to be of great quality. Look at some of the old national champions with their short, short little legs and bigger bodies and heads. Times and quality change.

As long as we continue to inbreed and line breed we will continue to have not only dwarf problems but some serious health issues. We need to learn from some of the other breeds about the problems that can occur - not just horses but other animals (like dogs).

We all need to be responsible for our own breeding programs and do our best not to breed to just make money but also to better the miniature horse (regardless of height or registry).

I think you do need to tell the breeders of the horses that had the dwarf, for your own peace of mind.

We have had one dwarf born here - it was minimal and we had one mare that we sold have a minimal dwarf(I actually went out to see the colt and told her that it was a dwarf - she just thought it was so "cute"). Both mares had had 5 or 6 other foals and both were bred to different stallions - and to my knowledge neither of the studs had had any other dwarfs. I continued to breed all considered just never the same cross again and after 3 more years have not had another dwarf.

One question - Can you register a minimal dwarf? My understadning and I could be way off is that one characteristic is allowed. Can anyone tell us what the ruling is on that for both AMHA and AMHR.

Thanks, Gypsygal

 

[Minimor]

If I bought a bred mare & she foaled a dwarf, yes, I would tell the stallion owner, whether they wanted to hear it or not. I know there are some that would be interested, some that wouldn't care and others that would outright deny that it is possible (those would say it can't really be a dwarf, or it must be all the mare's fault or some such thing)