The OP said she is aware of the costs and has her finances in order.
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One further issue is your recipient mare. Best to not use a maiden mare for this, because you do not know what sort of mother she will be. Find an experienced, fertile broodmare, who has previously carried, and foaled out successfully, has great mothering skills, and plenty of good quality milk. Maiden mares are always a crap shoot when it comes to mothering skills, until PROVEN. It would be a pity to successfully get an embryo, pay the vet expenses, get it implanted, then have the mare reject, kick, or not care successfully for the foal. Not all maiden mares are good mothers.
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I agree that using the repro center’s recip mare is your best bet.
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From my own experiences breeding an older mare, I would be definitely ask your vet about using a ovulation inducing drug like Sucromate to help time ovulation.
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Yes, but depending on how much effort they put into this, costs could escalate like crazy.
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Horses aren’t humans; don’t anthropomorphize. Live cover isn’t “pleasurable” for the majority of mares.
And no, the majority of us no longer advocate for the “throw them in a field together and see what happens” approach due to the risks to all involved. It also doesn’t “absolutely work” in all cases.
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Well, animals do tend to have an urge to procreate. Left to their own devices they tend to do it as much as possible. I don’t think that’s anthropomorphism. If you don’t spay/ neuter/ geld/ segregate male and female (depending on care practice for that species) you will get maximum numbers of kittens, puppies, foals, etc. Animals want to reproduce, it’s kind of the whole point for them. Obviously not every animal is going to be or remain at optimum fertility. But every time some irresponsible hoarder lets their long yearling colts live on in the pasture with the mares and fillies, the pregnancy rate is very high.
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Male animals do. I’m not so sure about females.
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Not sure why you are piling on the OP about doing an ET. I definitely wouldn’t breed a 21 year old maiden to carry and wouldn’t breed any mare this late in the year but I see no reason she shouldn’t do an ET on her mare if she wants to. It’s not like she is saying she wants to start a foal mill to squeeze some dollars out of her mare. My ET foal just went to the trainer to start her hunter career on Tuesday. We are thrilled to have her.
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It isn’t just futurities or any other competition that would make me not breed a mare this time of year, it’s the heat. Foals can not regulate their body temps very well for the first month or so. It’s relatively easy to keep them warm in cold weather but can be impossible to keep them cool enough in hot weather. I had a friend who had to wrap her stall with plastic and use portable air conditioners to keep her newborn alive during a heat wave. Not everyone is set up to do something like that.
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To be fair, it’s not roasting everywhere. There was snow in Montana a couple weeks ago.
But it’s still awfully late, considering pre breeding exams haven’t occurred, there may be a need to clear infection, which could extend breeding dates further, the first breeding might not take, etc etc etc. It’s not hard to see this extending into Sept or further, and fertility often declines late in the summer, making it that much harder…
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Yes, it’s ridiculously hot and after speaking with the repro vets they strongly recommended putting her under lights around Thanksgiving and then bringing her for the very beginning of the breeding season in Feb which is what I’m going to do (and do ET). It’s stupid hot now and would be miserable for everyone!
Thanks so much for the input, everyone. I’ve clarified my course of action and really appreciate the replies with your personal experiences!
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Good luck next spring! Please let us know how it goes.
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And you criticize others who are long-time breeders with actual experience and long time respected members of this board with a comment like this?
“where people who have nobody listening to them irl come to forums like these to make people their punching bag.”
Really??? and then to add the incredibly snarky, disingenuous “hope this helps”.
Yikes.
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When i was a younger person, i felt my horse irreplaceable. One is a million! And she was! Upon her death i was inconsolable. Had to go to therapy.
When i was 30 and my first dog ever turned one year old, i began stressing about his eventual death. He was one in a million. Very special in every way.
Now that i’m 70, i’ve had several exceptional K9 partners, each unique and each every-bit-as-wonderful and so different from all the others. Had the original dog never died, i’d never had had the chance to meet and love all the following dogs.
Same with horses, though their lifespan is so delightfully long. I feel no need any more to replicate. What i’ve found, in my old age, is that there are SO MANY wonderful animals out there, just waiting to enter my life. I don’t stress the demise of ‘bloodlines’ any more.
That’s just my experience.
and …fwiw, my opinion: i would not breed a 21 year old mare, for reasons of her health and wellbeing…especially if i loved her. Nor would i harvest her eggs, as i would fear degradation and a foal that wasn’t quite right.
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Interesting anthropomorphic observations, but these aren’t borne out in equine reality. We don’t see trisomy 21 in horses, and any ovum that is so blighted as to be not viable, simply doesn’t develop as an embryo.
Breeders understand that every time we breed a mare we risk losing her, no matter how old she is.
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quick google gave me several similar responses:
A mare’s reproductive tract undergoes changes with age. The older she is, the more likely she will have problems becoming pregnant. At 17, her eggs are starting to age and have an increased risk of chromosomal abnormalities . The lining of the uterus (endometrium) degenerates and becomes fibrotic over time.Sep 16, 2019
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Yes, but those issues cause the mare to not become pregnant or have an early embryonic death. There are no reports that I’m aware of in the scientific literature of older mares producing live (or stillborn/aborted) foals with genetic defects due to the mare’s age.
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