Teasing, breeding Covering Mares

[minister man]

I thought it best to start a new topic with this although lots of us have already been talking about your new 3 year old stud "Oliver".

I have been reading about the teasing and covering process, and it seems like most of what is written is designed for the Big horses.

SO How much of the breeding equipment is also necessary for the miniature horses? I would rather have too much stuff than have someone get hurt.

I have seen plans/ pictures of solid teasing walls, and also teasing shoots with a wall on each side of the mare. I know that they would have to be lower for a miniature, but do miniature breeders use them at all? which one the chute? or the wall?

Then once it is determined to try to cover the mare, there are plans for a "breeding stall" that has triangle sides that the mare stands between. I am guessing it keeps her in place and her feet from striking? Does anyone have the demensions for building one for minis? OR does anyone use one?

 

[supaspot]

I dont use any gadgets , we introduce mare and stallion on halters , if she is receptive she will stand , even maidens , Ive only ever had one mare kick out ,

 

[FurstPlaceMiniatures]

Honestly, I always pasture bred. Ran him with the mare until she foaled, they'd be separate for a week or so because the mare was such a witch about her baby, then back in he went.

 

[amysue]

In my opinion, your best bet is to enlist the help of one of your horse savvy friends to hold one of the two while you hold the other to introduce them. If he is a gentleman, he should be polite and respectfully advance on her and if she is at all ready, then she most likely accept his advance. If she is not in heat, then she will most likely show signs of not wanting his advances ie. pinning ears back, squealing or kicking. It may take a bit of time for her to accept being covered, you should be able to see visual and behavioral clues when she is coming into heat, squatting to urinate frequently, winking her vulva etc. I have a few horses that I allow to pasture breed, as they mind their manners and I do not worry too much about them injuring one another. Others, I have to hand breed with an assistant handler, either because the mare will kick or if allowed to bolt from the stud, she will (even when the vet says she is ready to breed), or because the stallion will become overly aggressive if allowed to chase the mare. I do not see the need for teasing boards or walls becsuse you are only planning on breeding the one mare, you are not trying to protect a million dollar stallion or give him the old switcheroo teasing him with a decoy to get him to cover the broodmare or collection cup. As for hobbles, I rarely use them, a lady in my area lost a horse using them, stallion fell off of her and got his leg stuck in the line on the hobble, while she managed to snap the safety on it she flipped over backwards and split her head open. All I would invest in this endeavor if I was you (for the breeding part anyway) would be good strong halters and leads, a stud chain for Oliver and some cohesive bandage to wrap the dock of her tail during covering to prevent bruising and to make clean up easier, instead of having to wash her tail, just unwrap and discard the bandage.

 

[Field-of-Dreams]

We tease over/through the fence. It's a strong woven wire horse fence with pipe on the top. He can't get to them and they can't kick him. If she is receptive, she'll squat and pee. If not, she'll squeal and kick.

If she is receptive, we take him away and bring her out. Typically we have two people, a stallion handler and a mare handler. I can breed my boys myself, I tie the mare and handle him. Otherwise we have "the spot" where the mares are covered, and the boys know it. We teach them that we are there to help, both by holding her still and helping him find the "place", by pulling her tail aside and physically gently helping him penetrate.

We tried pasture breeding three times. First year was great, Elvis covered all his girls very well. Second year was a disaster- all he did was run them to exhaustion. I yanked him out after 24 hours when I found Cheyenne soaking wet and hardly able to stand, she was so beat. One poor girl was literally hiding in the trees. Last year we tried with Lotto and three mares. Only one conceived, not our typical average when hand breeding. This year we hand bred three. So we'll see! Normally when we hand breed conception rate is close to 100%.

 

[minister man]

Ok, Sounds like I don't need all that stuff then. I just want to keep it simple but at the same time I want to keep everyone safe. He may not be a million dollar stallion, but he is mine and I will treat him well.

 

[amysue]

I did not mean that he was not worth protecting, it just sounds like he already has good manners and is easy to handle, so going through the trouble isn't necessary. In a pinch, you can make a wall of hay or straw bales for the minis to meet each other to prevent kicking.

 

[Miniv]

We pasture breed....Although a young stallion with his first mare really should learn "manners", so hand breeding is a good way to go

for that.....

We use two of us.....I usually handle the mare and my husband has the young stallion. We bring the stallion up to her head/neck area first

and encourage him to "flirt". If she's receptive, we let him work his way down and pull him back if he becomes too aggressive. If she's not

in standing heat yet, she will probably kick out, so be prepared.......You will also most likely have to repeat this process more than once and

over a few days. HE needs to learn about the "flirting" and also when to get out of the way of a kick and respect it......

With experience, the stallion will learn about reading the signs and also SMELLING when the mare is ready. After a first successful breeding,

we tend to allow them to be together.....unless we feel he needs more "instruction".

 

[minister man]

If you took your mare out to be covered, would you expect the farm with the stud to be equipped with a teasing wall?

 

[minister man]

I was reading that most people that hand mate breed on the 3 day of heat, and every second day there after. Do you count the due date from the first breeding? or the last breeding?

 

[chandab]

Calculations are from last breeding date.

 

[minister man]

What is the product that is used for a tail wrap? do they need that?

 

[chandab]

Don't know about mini size, but they make tail protectors that Velcro on for trailering, that are convenient for use during breeding. Otherwise, just Vetwrap, Co-Flex, generic cohesive wrap. It can be helpful to keep the tail hair out of the way while breeding.

 

[amysue]

I think National Bridle carries the tail wraps, or atleast they used to. I bet star lake or ozark would have them. I use vetwrap or a similar brand to wrap the tail. If pulled out of the way, there is less of a chance of bruising the dock, then you're just trying to keep it clean. It can be hard to hold onto the tail with all of the moving around, I find that braiding it helps. When shipping full-size horses to a breeder it is more common to see the set up for artificial, ie. stocks, teasing boards etc. The services offered at the stud farm will vary depending on the scale of the operation.

 

[paintponylvr]

I use polo wraps that i can throw in the washer. Here is a pic of a mare with her tail wrapped for foaling - (arab mare produced a 1/2 Shetland filly just hours after I took this photo - after I was at work and the girls' and 3 classmates in attendance while Larry, hubby, inside asleep after his night shift). For breeding, I often just wrap the top portion of the tail and leave the bottom below the tailbone hanging free. Just depends on how I'm wrapping that day & if I feel or know that I may need to grab that loose part of her tail to pull it out of the way (easier for me when by myself). I bet you can find someone where you are that carries polo wraps - maybe even mini sized (less bulk) w/o overseas shipping costs...

Here is a Shetland mare (37" tall) - w/ her tail also wrapped for foaling...

As to your other 2 ?s - most of the breeding farms I've sent my own mares to did not have a full teasing wall. They did have a specific area that they took the horses to for breeding and yes, if there was only one person the mare was the one tied up to a sturdy arrangement. I've been breeding ponies now since 1995 (until 1997, I had one shetland mare smaller than my shetland stallion) and have had 4 different breeding arrangements at different properties. I actually used to tie a mare (especially a full sized horse) to the horse trailer - essentially a "wall" and sturdy - when I was leasing property and didn't have fencing sturdy enough to use.. When I first bred larger pony and horse sized mares to our stallion, the mares were essentially X-tied with their hind legs against the floor of the trailer and our stallion on the inside of the trailer. He covered 6 mares that way over a 3 yr period - only once did he forget that his hooves couldn't go too far forward (and that could have been a bad wreck but thankfully wasn't). It worked! Then I built a set of stocks - I could put mares larger than him in and put a 10" solid platform with a toe stop behind it that he stood on to cover the mares. We live covered mares up to 16.1hh (he was 11.1 hh) that way. None of the walls on the stocks were solid - just two rails on one side and one on the other. We also could tease the mare that way... Sorry pics weren't on public photo albums and went away when original computer crashed.

Here is the 2nd set of stocks we built on a different property. The mare shown is 13.1hh and was covered in these stocks by a stallion that is only 10hh - also with a platform behind her. A full size horse mare, as it turned out, wouldn't fit in these stocks as we'd built them a little too short/narrow, LOL. My vet has a wall in her open, outdoor wash bay that would work great for a breeding wall - for full size horses (her own are TB & warm bloods)...

If I didn't know the mare, I didn't wait till the 3rd day of her heat to cover her. I've had many mares actually only "show" and be receptive/willing for that 3 days - then she'd turn into a nasty, kicking, striking, squalling "machine". Our 1ststallion was good - he let us know when a mare was ready and I had a very strong rapport with him (could read him). Our 2nd - was definitely not the same - he was a shy breeder and we missed a mare or two when I handled him for breeding and he completely lost interest. Our 3rd and 4th stallions (own them now) have been handled differently and have had a whole lot less breeding experience thus far and I haven't had the same rapport with them yet...

I've had two mares that were in "heat" for extra long times... The one, when I was growing up, we managed to get covered at least 2 times. But it wasn't easy. The owner wanted her bred regardless of how the mare felt about it and we sent her home. The vet checked - not pregnant BUT turned out she was cystic (why she was so "devilish"). They sent a different mare to be bred, she was on our property less than a week and 10 months later a beautiful colt born. 2nd - in 2000 - was a mare that the owner also insisted was "always like that" and I needed to keep her covered until she "went out of heat"... For 21 days, she was covered every other day. Our stallion got to the point he'd hide his head in a corner of his pen when we showed up with his "breeding halter". We did a bait and switch the last several times with him (thank goodness, I had help) as he refused to directly mount her... She was confirmed in foal and stayed with us for a while (boarded). Think around 3 months (maybe more?), she went home. Then 1 or 2 months later (well before her due date) - she suddenly bagged up and started streaming milk. Other issues, too. The vet called in - I don't know what all the symptoms were. But she had a calcium imbalance - know owner kept her on calcium right up till she re-developed an udder before foaling. She also had a very nice colt.

Most of the mares I've personally dealt with were really short from starting to show heat/be receptive to end heat/not receptive. I've followed many of the exact same practices already described - so I haven't gone into more detail.

 

[minister man]

There is no chance that my mini stud would breed my Standardbred mare, right? I never really thought of that until you said your Arabian was bred to a Shetland.

 

[chandab]

There is no chance that my mini stud would breed my Standardbred mare, right? I never really thought of that until you said your Arabian was bred to a Shetland.

If there's a will there is a way. Full size mares have been known to lay down to accommodate small stallions.

 

[Miniv]

In answer to the Breeding Wall question........That's an item used for full sized horses. Have never seen one for minis.

And yes, a full size mare WILL lay down for a miniature stallion.....if in standing heat. I've seen it happen, but very dangerous for the mini.

 

[amysue]

My hafflinger mare laid down for my mini stud, Blue when she got out and wandered into his yard. We had the vet give Lutalyse as a precaution.

 

[paintponylvr]

We had one mare that we never did know how she became in foal originally (?laid down, stood in a hole, squatted low enough?). She never came into season when we first moved to NC. We lost a colt from her during a blizzard in March 97 in MT - about 30 days before we moved to NC. The vet hounded me about breeding an "itty bitty" mare to a "big 'ol Thoroughbred" - and how wrong it was (her 1/2 arab colt was over 100 lbs (sire was a 14.1 hh Arab that was more petite than Sioux, the mare) and had had the air cut off in the cord - we tried resuscitating him - didn't work. Anyhoo - after she finally let us remove the colt from the stall/pen, she was turned out.

When we got to NC in April, she was turned out on pasture & AJ was out too. Didn't think anything of it, because he was a mere 45" to her 55-3/4" and her back side was 2x wider than he was. Couldn't happen, could it???

HA! She not only had another HUGE filly (the NC vet was like - "NO WAY - is that baby by a SHETLAND stallion") - she had had twins - and one died in-utero before got past a certain stage (can't remember how far along). After that, the NC vet confirmed not only when she was bred but we checked for twins every time. She produced another 4 foals for us - had to use Regumate, too, for parts of her pregnancies. It was worth it...

The first xbred filly by our stallion out of Sioux. The last pics I have of her are as a yearling at a local show with her owners. I don't have any pics, but know that she matured to the same size as her dam. She's a family riding and driving pony, sold to military family here and then went to KY with them. They still have her.

On her foal heat, Sioux was one of the mares backed up to the trailer for breeding. Her 99 filly, Cherokee, is the smallest of our Sioux/AJ babies at maturity. She was owned for many years by a smaller adult rider who had physical disabilities and Cherokee's size and easy gaits worked well for her -

Again backed up to the trailer on her foal heat, her 2000 colt, Apache. We didn't think he'd ever grow, he stayed small for years! Recently, his owner sent me a FB message saying he'd hit 13.2 hh. I was amazed... AJ's offspring sure could JUMP. Apache is one who did Dressage and 3 day Eventing with a little person for many years.

We had 2 other foals out of Sioux, by AJ. The mare, Autumn, was born in 2001. Autumn changed hands several times, before going to the same woman who had Cherokee. Then she came back to us to get lots of mileage - the girls sometimes ought over who would ride her. For some reason, I only have a few pics of that whole time (she was with us for about 4 months). Sioux's last colt, Shield, was born in 2005 when she was 24 yrs old. Unfortunately, not 2 weeks after I took a deposit on him at 2 months of age, he started scooping up & literally eating sand. Wasn't long - the sand colic was severe and he had a perforated gut and we euthanized him. VERY painful all the way around. I have many more pics...

The two largest mares that AJ was bred to both ended up not being able to support their pregnancies. They were both outside mares. The one mare, we tried 4 different times - over a 2 yr period. She'd conceive and carry until about 4 months (120 days). Then, on US, you could literally watch something in her body destroy the embryo (it was like watching Pac Man). Tried different protocols to try to maintain the pregnancy. It was both fascinating and frustrating!! The owner was one of the vets in the clinic, so we tried some pretty interesting things. But, the $$ weren't there for doing an embryo transfer. She checked, LOL.