Again - to whom are you referring? The breeders who resell their unused doses? If they bought them with no contract clause that precludes resale, then why do you consider it shady? Can’t you do the same with the doses you buy? IOW, since there is no contract, the doses are yours to use as you wish.
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Yes, exactly. Also if a vet is using one single sperm for IVF fertilization it seems wasteful to not use up the whole tube on other embryos. Especially since the catch rate is lowish.
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I think the whole ICSI is still a gray area though and one where contracts and the law and breed registry rules may not have caught up yet. . A bit like sharing your music collection with your best friend.
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I would not do business with someone that knowingly had a contract on the semen and split it. But straws are straws and if they were allowed to be split etc then nonissue. Just like I will let friends buy like a single cut off straws I own. I have a large semen bank only because I’m slowly growing my breeding vision so producing 12-15 a year now
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I also would not want to do business with people if I knew for a fact that they were breaking their contract by splitting doses. I think it is very difficult to know that though, without asking them directly - and then I would be in the position of having to assume they were being truthful (or not). I am betting that most of them would claim that their contract doesn’t forbid splitting - or that they don’t have a contract at all that contains usage language.
Also (FWIW), I know a fair number of breeders who - like you - have built their own semen banks over the years. Many of them have their own storage tanks, and some folks have quite the collection. I think some of the “resales” happen because the breeder is running out of room in the tank but wants to purchase doses from additional stallions, so will offer the doses they know they will never use. Some of them will only sell full doses but others will sell by the straw - and it is between them and the buyer to uphold any contracts in place regarding usage (it depends on the language in the seller’s contract as to whether they have to pass forward the usage policy - and the contracts I have seen don’t contain those provisions).
At any rate, I find your business model interesting and is close to what I myself considered some years back (unfortunately life got in the way - career demands, elderly relatives who needed care, health issues, etc.) One of my biggest concerns was regarding unsold foals - once they reach 3 years of age and need to go into training, costs go up dramatically. I was going to try to circumvent that by keeping mares in Germany (where boarding/foal rearing/training is much, much less expensive than in the U.S.) , but the savings would have been offset somewhat by import costs. At any rate, I never got to implement my plan due to the other demands on my time, finances, and focus. 
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It doesn’t mean you could not look into doing it now? I have had two other breeding operations just purchase foals from me for their programs and now we are doing some other business things together. And a very reputable breeder in Canada and I split a lot of our expensive icsi straws and help each other out. So there is a way! Yes sometimes it is completely overwhelming, but exciting at the same time. I have been blessed to make so many amazing connections throughout my business so that I have great people to lean and rely on through this crazy mess. Of course it was frustrating my first two foal crops the keurings were cancelled, but still I am looking forward to 2023 with 10 due!
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Nah, the calendar has flipped too many times since I considered doing it and I am not in any position age-wise or health-wise to embark on such a risky endeavor. The last thing I want to do is leave my beneficiaries with a bunch of mares, foals, and frozen semen to have to figure out what to do with!
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Do you wear flip flops around horses?
I wouldn’t count on getting any business from anyone here. I suppose it doesn’t hurt to try…
Breeding horses is an expensive endeavor. Making business deals with people, who are novices, and not well established breeders with excellent reputations, is a very risky business. Especially when only knowing their online presence.
Add in some very dubious online discourse, some neglected mares which are blamed on others, several questions regarding honesty that have not been answered in a straightforward manner, and that’s a hard no for most breeders that have quality programs.
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I can’t quite see buying a foal in utero to use in a breeding program, or indeed a foal at all. Even if one wasn’t committed to putting a performance record in the breeding stock, I’d think you’d want to see adult confirmation, mind, and talent before adding it to a breeding program.
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While I don’t know how many breeding programs buy foals in utero I do know that it isn’t uncommon at all to have mares with no performance records but based on bloodlines. Spycoast is a major breeder and many of their broodmares do not have performance records. What Kasheare is doing in that aspect is not unusual at all.
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With respect to Warmbloods, it takes 10 years (?) to see what you have-as to whether truly FEI quality. No breeder unless already a multi-millionaire is going to be able to develop their mares produce to demonstrate that quality and the mare is likely to be very old by that time.(Can you image how many horses you would have and how broke you would be after even 5 years…?)
In contrast quarter horses/ranch horses and thoroughbreds have a much shorter time frame in which to demonstrate performance. However, I don’t think expecting a breeder to develop the produce is a “do-able” business model there either, nor followed for the most part unless you cannot sell (you end up keeping to race for example and likely don’t breed that mare back!) The advantage of the latter breeds is you find out what the mare is producing performance wise a lot quicker and can “cull” as needed. (Cull meaning stop breeding that mare.)
(Edited to add: Of course as others have pointed out, it also underlines the importance of increasing your chances for success and increasing the chances you know what you will get by breeding from a strong mare family.)
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It’s really not that unusual.
Many very successful Warmblood breeders invest in mares either in utero or very young, based on pedigree.
To bring a dressage mare up to High Performance standards requires a huge investment in training and time, and takes away many years of potential productivity unless they are so phenomenal that they are kept in training and ET is used.
Performance testing as young horses in the KWP help identify exceptional mares at a young age, minus a show career.
So, really there are some extremely successful breeding systems where exceptional mirrors are purposefully retained from a very young age for breeding. This also happens consistently in the Iberian world. So much so, that it’s a relatively new thing for the Spanish/Portuguese to invest in training in their mares.
Historically, the best mares are retained for breeding purposes, not performance. This is changing, but it’s still more the norm to retain the best mares for breeding rather than performance.
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Guess that’s just your program? Would love to see what you’re breeding. And it’s funny I’ve gotten many prospective buyers from this discourse lol
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I remember one of the Holsteiner breeders here mentioning this many years ago. The Holsteiner studbook gives great credence to, and has been very cognizant of, their stamm lines. The very well bred, well conformed mares were kept for breeding.
Of course , that was only done after several generations of that mare line had been proven, over and over again.
The Holsteiner breeder that I am remembering was very knowledgeable and very generous with their experience.
I do miss some of the accomplished breeders that no longer participate here…
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This what I often heard when I traveled to Germany fairly frequently back in the very early 2000s. We went to a plethora of stallion stations, broodmare and foal raising operations, and some operations that specialized in starting young horses. I remember seeing a lovely 2 year filly by De Niro that I was interested in purchasing. When I mentioned that I was envisioning a riding career for her, the breeder said “No, she comes from a top dam line and is super high quality, so she must go into a breeding program.” She told me that she would consider selling a co-ownership but the filly had to remain in Germany for at least five years for breeding. I didn’t want her THAT badly - there were too many risks involved - so I passed.
Also, most of the breeding discussions on this forum have taken place on the Breeding forum as riders in general didn’t have much interest in the nitty-gritty of breeding issues. That has changed somewhat - as evidenced by this thread - as more people have become aware of the importance of bloodlines and sound breeding methodologies. However, as you mentioned, many breeders with good experience and knowledge no longer participate on this forum at all and have instead moved their discussions to various FB groups.
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“Breed the best, ride the rest” is the old adage.
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How does one know they are the best if they are never ridden doing what they in theory do?
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“Breed the best and ride the rest” works as a result of a depth of knowledge from multiple generations, rigorous inspection (utterly lacking in the US stock horse world), and ruthless culling. It’s obviously been a successful model in Europe and the Iberian peninsula. While there has in the past been perhaps a stigma against Performance mares, I really think that’s dissipated. What remains is a very sound breeding culture that greatly values exceptional mares for what they bring to the genetics. Why would a breeder sacrifice possibly a decade of foals when their actual business is breeding and improving with each generation?
Why on earth would someone not want to breed the best? If you’re trying to improve of course that would be the choice. Otherwise you would be downgrading with every generation.
The advent of ET puts a new spin on this. I myself have a coming three year old gelding who is the result of ET. His dam was bred as a young horse, and had one foal at four. Then she was started. Her first foal was bought by an international GP rider. She was the highest scoring horse in North America when she was inspected by the KWPN.
The mare produced three ET foals the next year, and went into training with the same GP rider in wellington.
It will be interesting to see how this all plays out in the future.
Picture of my boy because I love him.
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There’s a three year old mare in my barn, by a well-regarded jumper sire and out of a mare who was supposed to be a dressage horse, but was intractable. So hey, let’s breed her!
Guess whose temperament this young mare inherited?
She kicks other horses (only a well-placed rail stopped her from inflicting damage on my horse), kicks at her owner when he tries to lunge her, tries to bite everyone who walks by her stall, and kills chickens and then eats them.
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