Contender mare, stallion choices??

[LadyLox]

Hi people, I am brand new to the site, and also a newcomer to breeding Holsteiners. I have been researching bloodlines for several years since acquiring a Contender mare. It was not in my initial plan to breed her, but she has been an outstanding performer for our daughter who is competing in the amateur SJumpers, and I would like to get some foals from her.

The goal is to produce an offspring that can compete higher than the 1.2m she is currently doing. I would like to find the very best stallion for her, and would welcome some opinions.

While she can jump like stink, she can be a little careless with the rails. She has what I consider a great temperament for jumping, just a tad on the heated side; which I don’t want to change. Conformationally, she’s pretty much a spitting image of her sire. Her stamm line is 5819.

Any suggestions?

[RyTimMick]

Ladylox,

What is her full pedigree?

Use this format, its best…

Sire(Contender)/Dam Sire/G.Dam Sire/GG.Dam Sire stamm

Thanks

Tim

[LadyLox]

[QUOTE=RyTimMick;5901398]
Ladylox,

What is her full pedigree?

Use this format, its best…

Sire(Contender)/Dam Sire/G.Dam Sire/GG.Dam Sire stamm

Thanks

Tim[/QUOTE]

Her pedigree:Pabbles

Contender/Lagos/Roman/Nautilus xx

[ne1]

hmm … i’ve bred a mare with somewhat similar blood for several years. (http://www.paardenfokken.nl/pedigree.php?horseid=513234&maxniveau=6) its not exactly the same, but close enough that when you say she looks like contender it is not hard to picture her. your girl is nicely linebred to ladykiller and ramses, with an interesting double-up on the 18b1 mare dorette on her mother’s side.

as a disclaimer i simply do not believe in all the non-sensical hypo matches that get thrown around on here by folks who have very widely ranging credibility to make such suggestions. but i’ll offer some things to think about.

firstly, you want to breed something that will jump more than 1.2m? you should be able to put a dressage stallion or even a donkey to a mare like that and get such a beast. if not, i’d question her candidacy as a broodmare.

then you raise the carefulness issue. this can be sticky. her blood certainly isn’t widely known for hitting the woodwork, and often it is hard to say whether such a propensity is genetic or environmental (training). horses ridden for long periods by riders of questionable quality can end up less careful.

then the contender type. he can make beautiful and he can make sausages on sticks. also, your mare is not super-high on blood content, so if me, i would be erring on the side of a typey, long-legged stallion with higher blood content if i could find it. (but we’re all looking for that most of the time anyway!) although at first glance i would be hesitant to label the mare uncareful (not knowing her ridden history) i would still probably stay away from some of the nicer stallions which nonetheless aren’t quite ‘all that’ in their jumping technique.

much of the consideration is not so much about what TO do, but about thinking about what NOT to do, in making your choice; narrowing the possibility for a less favourable outcome.

my contender mare has worked best with cassini blood, as did cunningham’s mother! if she is well conformed in the legs and not too hot to ride, a baloubet son may also be a consideration (oops, just saw where you said she was hot… i’d steer a different path). there will be many other possibilities for a mare bred as she is. much will depend on what is not known… her type more specifically, her way of going, her conformational correctness / incorrectness in the different areas.

just some thoughts…

nick

www.hiddenpearlfarm.com

[RyTimMick]

Well, I can’t make suggestion because I don’t know your mare. However, this is what I dug up on your mare.

She has a half sister by Carolus I. She has already had a foal also by Carolus that was sold in the Elite Sport Horse auction last year. The entire stamm goes back to the Nautilus xx mare Bilbao(same name has her mare). The stamm has a had a few notables in the Int. show jumping arena. Casino is the most recognizable and has been ranked with WBFSH with Norway rider Morten Djupvik. He is Cash/Lord/Calvados II/Farnese/Fax I/Nautilus xx. Gettina ridden by Otto Becker is Ahorn/Fantus/Cardinal/Nautilus xx. There is also Comme Ci Comme Ca and Toi Toi Toi. A total of 6 approved stallions Casino, Chariol, Landioso, Le Coeur, Tiepolo, and Zunftiger, and they all descend to Bibao.

Her dam sire is Lagos sire of Lens - Land of Kings, Margie GP mount who was the first Horse in Europe I think to jump 2.1m. He is also the sire of Lacoste. Lagos like other Ladykiller sons did very well with making mares. Next in line is Roman, another fabulous mare maker and is seen twice in Calido.

Her sire is non other then Contender, he doesn’t really need much of an introduction, and he has been removed from stallion services this year and may no longer breed.

So depending on the amount of blood in her way of going you have many choices fresh and frozen. Only one Cor de la Bryere, no Capitol and what appears to be plenty of blood with double Ladykiller xx, Ramzes, and Nautilus xx.

I think your Capitol line sires are good. You can certainly hit her with more Cor de La Bryere blood, and that might help her with her carefulness issues.

I hope this helps.

Good Luck.

Tim

[ne1]

yes, that casino from her stam finished up the beijing olympics in joint 10th place individually, and with team bronze for norway. unfortunately the team medal was lost due to a different holsteiner on the norwegian team found with a banned substance, but still a good showing from this stam.

its only somewhat relevant to the mare… they join up back at the 1965 mare tim mentioned… bilbao. she was the contender mare’s great-grandmother and casino’s great-great-great grandma. but its better than NOT being connected to an olympic horse back in 1965!

[szipi]

Great points

The posters brought up some very good points. In my experience, a lot of very talented , very careful jumpers are made “careless” by the environmental factor - the training. Some of the most important factors I came across:

1. Inadequate dental work. It’s not enough that the horse’s teeth are “floated” once a year by your local vet. If my performance horses’ teeth are not done by an excellent performance dentist every 6 months, there’s a noticable decline in the quality of the jump.
2. Saddle fit. It’s not enough that the saddle has the correct fit NOW - if a young horse was started in an ill-fitting saddle, or the horse has had a period of time training/performing in an ill-fitting saddle, the effects will last, until those effects are corrected.
3. Horse being a roarer - there’s a profound difference even when the flap is only 10-15% paralized. Most riders don’t even notice it and if so, vets dismiss it that “it’s not paralyzed enough” yet to affect the horse’s perfomance. In my experience there is a profound negative effect if the horse is asked to jump correcly, in contact.
4. Starting navicular disease or coffin joint problem. In a lot of horses who had been excellent, careful jumpers, I experienced some unexplained rails either in training or in competition - but only once in a while, out of the blue. I felt we got to the jumps absolutely perfectly and for whatever reason the horse touched the rail, or jumped over without knocking it down but there was a wierd twist in the jump. No lameness… until a few months down the road, when the real reason revealed itself.

[Jewels09]

Hot and careless? :no: My least favorite combo. If you want to retain the blood be careful with Cassini blood. That will create something even heavier (unless a son of Cassini with a lot of blood is used) and won’t speed things up in the front end. Is this mare in the US? Just wondering because of stallion options

[eniskerry]

I’m not trying to make any specific recommendations for you, but I’ll just share my experience breeding a Contender mare. I had a Contender/Latus II/Tumbled xx mare stamm 730b. Sadly she only had two foals for me before I lost her to colic. She was a big, very large-framed mare, a little old-fashioned in type conformationally, but very forward and definitely not a “cold” temperament. Not a good mover at all from a dressage perspective, but I wouldn’t have expected her to be. She came to me after a career-ending injury, but she jumped in Holland as a young horse. I have a few pictures of her at http://fridayschildfarm.com/Skye.htm

Her first foal for me was by Lordship, who is now deceased but I think still available via frozen. He was also quite large with the (in)famous Lord head, not a great mover but a big canter stride, and I think has the potential to be a great jumper. He sold to a jumper pro who has him in training now. Videos at http://fridayschildfarm.com/Lunar_Eclipse.htm

Her second foal is by Albarez (Alcatraz/Loutano/Fernando), a yearling filly who I’m keeping to replace her dam as a broodmare. In my obviously biased opinion, this filly is special. She will also be big. I’m assuming she’ll have jumping talent as well, but she’s surprised me with her how good her movement is. I plan to start her at 3 and possibly breed her via ET if I want to keep her going under saddle. I’m assuming she should go to the jumper ring, but she’s such a nice mover I may want to show her in dressage myself! This filly has the best temperament - brave, confident, curious, and friendly. Definitely an “old soul.” I was at a farm last weekend with several Albarez offspring of various ages and I think that’s a common trait from him. http://fridayschildfarm.com/Caledonia.htm

Good luck with your mare!

[RyTimMick]

@Jewels09;5902834

Hot and careless? :no: My least favorite combo. If you want to retain the blood be careful with Cassini blood. That will create something even heavier (unless a son of Cassini with a lot of blood is used) and won’t speed things up in the front end. Is this mare in the US? Just wondering because of stallion options

Certainly a conflict of challenges. You have to see which needs more fixing. Fixing both is difficult. Cantus blood can do this sometimes. Cassini II is certainly better in this case then #1 as he bred a little more from his Caletto II dam Wisma then is older brother.

Casiro, Cassiano, Cassito, Cassilano are the Capitol Sires I would look at. They all need different type mares, so choose wisely.

Tim

[LadyLox]

[QUOTE=ne1;5901724]
hmm … i’ve bred a mare with somewhat similar blood for several years. (http://www.paardenfokken.nl/pedigree.php?horseid=513234&maxniveau=6) its not exactly the same, but close enough that when you say she looks like contender it is not hard to picture her. your girl is nicely linebred to ladykiller and ramses, with an interesting double-up on the 18b1 mare dorette on her mother’s side.

as a disclaimer i simply do not believe in all the non-sensical hypo matches that get thrown around on here by folks who have very widely ranging credibility to make such suggestions. but i’ll offer some things to think about.

firstly, you want to breed something that will jump more than 1.2m? you should be able to put a dressage stallion or even a donkey to a mare like that and get such a beast. if not, i’d question her candidacy as a broodmare.

then you raise the carefulness issue. this can be sticky. her blood certainly isn’t widely known for hitting the woodwork, and often it is hard to say whether such a propensity is genetic or environmental (training). horses ridden for long periods by riders of questionable quality can end up less careful.

then the contender type. he can make beautiful and he can make sausages on sticks. also, your mare is not super-high on blood content, so if me, i would be erring on the side of a typey, long-legged stallion with higher blood content if i could find it. (but we’re all looking for that most of the time anyway!) although at first glance i would be hesitant to label the mare uncareful (not knowing her ridden history) i would still probably stay away from some of the nicer stallions which nonetheless aren’t quite ‘all that’ in their jumping technique.

much of the consideration is not so much about what TO do, but about thinking about what NOT to do, in making your choice; narrowing the possibility for a less favourable outcome.

my contender mare has worked best with cassini blood, as did cunningham’s mother! if she is well conformed in the legs and not too hot to ride, a baloubet son may also be a consideration (oops, just saw where you said she was hot… i’d steer a different path). there will be many other possibilities for a mare bred as she is. much will depend on what is not known… her type more specifically, her way of going, her conformational correctness / incorrectness in the different areas.

just some thoughts…

nick

www.hiddenpearlfarm.com[/QUOTE]

When you say higher blood content, what percentage are you referring to? For example, greater than 50%?

And I do believe the carefulness issue could be contributed to environmental. When we got her, she had been put through the ringer by the owner who had leased her out to many different trainers and their students, in the hopes of a quick and pricey sale based on her pedigree. She failed to impress as she inconsistently was taking rails. When we got her, her mouth was full of ulcers due to improper dental maintenance, and we have found she needs dental floats done twice a year.

Thank you for your input!

[LadyLox]

[QUOTE=RyTimMick;5901813]
Well, I can’t make suggestion because I don’t know your mare. However, this is what I dug up on your mare.

She has a half sister by Carolus I. She has already had a foal also by Carolus that was sold in the Elite Sport Horse auction last year. The entire stamm goes back to the Nautilus xx mare Bilbao(same name has her mare). The stamm has a had a few notables in the Int. show jumping arena. Casino is the most recognizable and has been ranked with WBFSH with Norway rider Morten Djupvik. He is Cash/Lord/Calvados II/Farnese/Fax I/Nautilus xx. Gettina ridden by Otto Becker is Ahorn/Fantus/Cardinal/Nautilus xx. There is also Comme Ci Comme Ca and Toi Toi Toi. A total of 6 approved stallions Casino, Chariol, Landioso, Le Coeur, Tiepolo, and Zunftiger, and they all descend to Bibao.

Her dam sire is Lagos sire of Lens - Land of Kings, Margie GP mount who was the first Horse in Europe I think to jump 2.1m. He is also the sire of Lacoste. Lagos like other Ladykiller sons did very well with making mares. Next in line is Roman, another fabulous mare maker and is seen twice in Calido.

Her sire is non other then Contender, he doesn’t really need much of an introduction, and he has been removed from stallion services this year and may no longer breed.

So depending on the amount of blood in her way of going you have many choices fresh and frozen. Only one Cor de la Bryere, no Capitol and what appears to be plenty of blood with double Ladykiller xx, Ramzes, and Nautilus xx.

I think your Capitol line sires are good. You can certainly hit her with more Cor de La Bryere blood, and that might help her with her carefulness issues.

I hope this helps.

Good Luck.

Tim[/QUOTE]

I have been looking at some CORD options, so this validates my thinking, thank you!

[LadyLox]

[QUOTE=szipi;5902699]
The posters brought up some very good points. In my experience, a lot of very talented , very careful jumpers are made “careless” by the environmental factor - the training. Some of the most important factors I came across:

1. Inadequate dental work. It’s not enough that the horse’s teeth are “floated” once a year by your local vet. If my performance horses’ teeth are not done by an excellent performance dentist every 6 months, there’s a noticable decline in the quality of the jump.
2. Saddle fit. It’s not enough that the saddle has the correct fit NOW - if a young horse was started in an ill-fitting saddle, or the horse has had a period of time training/performing in an ill-fitting saddle, the effects will last, until those effects are corrected.
3. Horse being a roarer - there’s a profound difference even when the flap is only 10-15% paralized. Most riders don’t even notice it and if so, vets dismiss it that “it’s not paralyzed enough” yet to affect the horse’s perfomance. In my experience there is a profound negative effect if the horse is asked to jump correcly, in contact.
4. Starting navicular disease or coffin joint problem. In a lot of horses who had been excellent, careful jumpers, I experienced some unexplained rails either in training or in competition - but only once in a while, out of the blue. I felt we got to the jumps absolutely perfectly and for whatever reason the horse touched the rail, or jumped over without knocking it down but there was a wierd twist in the jump. No lameness… until a few months down the road, when the real reason revealed itself.[/QUOTE]

Thanks, Andras, you have some excellent advice here. As mentioned in another post, I believe some of her carelessness could be attributed to environmental/training issues. And we did find her mouth full of ulcers when we first got her dental work done.
Despite regular dental maintenance, and 2 steady seasons working her in dressage to strengthen her, she does still take some careless rails. There is rider error there as well; my daughter is young and still learning, so it is to be expected.

[LadyLox]

[QUOTE=Jewels09;5902834]
Hot and careless? :no: My least favorite combo. If you want to retain the blood be careful with Cassini blood. That will create something even heavier (unless a son of Cassini with a lot of blood is used) and won’t speed things up in the front end. Is this mare in the US? Just wondering because of stallion options[/QUOTE]

Yes, I agree! lol, however, she is not that hot. Just the right amount of “perky”! Impatient is a good word for her-on the ground especially, but once on her, she just wants to get moving. She is very rideable.

[Jewels09]

Well if your daughter is young and learning you want her on something that isn’t too careful so it keeps jumping and is more forgiving of her mistakes. Sounds like she is very suitable.

[bluemoonfarms]

I can tell you that I have successfully bred my Contender mare to Pikadero, Couleur Rubin, Balou du Rouet and 3 times to Catoki. I am very happy with all of the resulting foals. I would like to try her with Livello but the Catoki’s are just so nice I keep going back to him. Good luck :)

[rodawn]

[QUOTE=RyTimMick;5902957]
Certainly a conflict of challenges. You have to see which needs more fixing. Fixing both is difficult. Cantus blood can do this sometimes. Cassini II is certainly better in this case then #1 as he bred a little more from his Caletto II dam Wisma then is older brother.

Casiro, Cassiano, Cassito, Cassilano are the Capitol Sires I would look at. They all need different type mares, so choose wisely.

Tim[/QUOTE]

Tim or Nick - Does the Holstein Verband publish their recommendations on stallions regarding mare types they have found that work best through foal and stallion/mare inspections? And/or a list of generalized traits the stallion tends to produce and/or improve upon? I’m just starting to do more study on Holstein (I have been more Hano or Old to this point), but I have a new jumping mare with some Hol blood way back and I was considering putting her to a Holstein stallion - not to hijack this thread, just wondering if the Verband publishes any sort of this information that could also help the OP as well as others looking at potential Hol stallions for their program.

[Bachus]

To answer the question of rodawn, the Holsteiner Verband is seriously looking into this! To help out newcomers in breeding with the Holsteiner breed.

This is how Cunningham his mother is bred; http://www.horsetelex.com/pedigree.php?horseid=103588

Here is an overview from your stamm;
http://www.horsetelex.com/family.php?horseid=530030

To come up with a stallion is difficult, I don’t know your mare. Dig out her line and find out what blood has worked well on her line.

[risingstarfarm]

How do you read the mareline information on horsetelex? I can understand some of it, but I lose track of the generations.

I ask, because I had mentioned my young Cassini I stallion to the OP and then I realized that they were from the same Stamm. When I looked at the mareline data you provided - I saw the dam of my stallion in the mareline of the OP’s horse and was interested in how they are related, etc.

His pedigree: Cassini I/ Acorado/ Corleone/ Lester Stamm 5819. His dam is Picarda I

If you would like to contact me privately so as not to hijack the thread from the OP - ronda@risingstarfarm.net
Thanks

[sniplover]

Isn’t linebreeding to (good) Stamms generally considered a good thing? Sounds like this it could be an educational derail/hijacking for plebs like me