Hi there
professional event rider/ jumper rider - amateur breeder.
my upper level mare sustained a significant injury that will require 12-18 month off. I’ve decided to breed her! She’s a 17 hand ISH mare by the Dutch stallion Orestus out of a flagmount king mare. She has lovely conformation, a lovey temperament and competed beautifully to the 2* level in Eventing and 1.20 in jumping. I’d like a stallion who’s well tempered, careful, and has a good bit of blood. I currently own two straws of Corland semen which I would like to side first but I understand that he’s not the most fertile. I had also looked at Coronado- the Chili Morning sob in California. Being her first foal I don’t want to go crazy on budget. Any suggestions??? Thanks!
How old is your mare? If you have budget considerations, and she is a maiden, and a little older, you might want to start out with fresh semen. You can usually get a live foal guarantee and for older mares, the odds of getting a quick conception are a bit better using fresh semen.
She is only 8!
Hey!
If you want blood and you event, I would look at sons of Heraldik.
H-Ekwador - competed GP dressage at the Olympics, have seen some beautiful sons of his!
Herald - GP show jumping, I think he is very athletic and would of been a beautiful event horse too.
Or also have a look at Royaldik who is out of Heraldik’s sister.
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For upper level potential , I’d go full TB stallion.
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Yes, by all means look at Thoroughbred stallions who have proven themselves in upper level eventing. You definitely need the blood! Or maybe a TK/TB. But match up the phenotype as best you can so you don’t get a foal with parts that don’t match.
Sorry but after having a lot of time on my hands to catch up on the TB lines in sport horses - mostly eventers - I do not see what would be the greatness of either one of H-Ekwador and Herald 3.
H-Ekwador got an elite predicate by BWP for like no reason at all, at least not if you look at the offspring where only one in BWPs database is at a competition age. North of the border the Dutch breeding values on OCD doesn’t speak in his favour. In Germany he have 21 offspring in total competing according to FN Verlag. None of them sticks out and especially not in eventing.
Herald 3 have zero offspring showing at the German FN Verlag. In France he has 107 registered offspring. 10 of them are seven years and older. Two of them seem more talented than the others and competed like 1.20m before corona which would be quite normal for an above average horse. In my opinion Herald himself have a terrible exterior.
That said I’ve seen really nice foals by both H-Ekwador and Herald III but these stallions would not be my first, second or third hand choice for any kind of breeding 
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I think a lot of breeding is on breeders instinct, if you dont like stallions someone recommends its totally reasonable, though it is hard to recommend them based on a very short description and no photos. I am sorry to suggest stallions that do not meet your criteria. All i was going of is that you event, your mare did before an injury and you want blood and temperament. You didnt mention if you want the resulting foal to sell, to keep, to event to 4*, to be a 1* horse?
You have to take into consideration that neither of the stallions have been heavily marketed while competing or much used. Which of course doesnt work in their favour. I wont agree that Herald has a terrible exterior?.. He has an athletic way of going, has plenty of blood, proven in sport, think he would of made a quality eventer. I do agree that H-Ekwador is slightly more ‘rogue’ suggestion. But I have seen stunning foals by him.
I am wary of using a full TB stallion on a warmblood mare, I believe it works better other way round. Thats why I would be looking at a higher % warmblood stallion. Event horse is very difficult to breed realistically.
Just some to look at:
- Colorit Z is surprisingly high %tb but again doesnt have a lot of children
- Can Tici
- Connect (seems to be producing nice event types?)
- Diacontinus (Diarado and Contendro are both proving good event sires) I have a mare in foal to him that has done similar to yours, competed foxhunter and cci as a 7yo.
What sort of stallions do you like? Corland though proven and rather lovely doesnt scream out event sire either and looking into him a bit more, there are 19 offspring at 2* and above out of over 2200 registered on horsetelex. And Coronado as a young unproven stallion to me doesnt have a strong enough damline to use now before he proves himself in sport or breeding.
Where are you based?
You don’t think a son of Heraldik (Ekwador) doing GP is impressive?
I like Herald III. A horse that can compete at the top of the sport for several years is important to me, and coming from a damline that has also produced several top athletes… well… That speaks for itself.
What did you not like about Herald III’s conformation…?
I was always under the impression that Heraldik horses were tough; this could just be my limited experience with them and I can’t say all of them came from easy mares either. Given the limited number of breedings and foals on the ground from both of these stallions (107 foals for a 22 year old stallion is not a big number to me), I’d reserve my judgment for the time being – but have always been interested in Herald III because I have always loved the mare line.
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I agree, I would like to see more foals by Herald as well. But it isnt necessarily a reflection on his quality as he was a competing stallion whos owners werent as interested in marketing him. And as you said a sound competitor too. Its interesting you mention that Heraldik horses arent easy, I dont have first hand experience, only watching some youngsters.
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Maybe look at Zapatero VDL (Chin Chin x Ircolando)? I like what I’ve been getting from him. Elisabeth Halliday has a horse by Zapatero VDL, Deniro Z jumping into the upper ranks of eventing too. The ones I’ve bred have super movement, modern lighter type and of course can jump. Deniro Z has French Buffet xx on the dam side. I’ve had a French Buffet from a big mare and he did refine. We have his frozen here. Interesting the comment above about not using thoroughbred on the warmblood dam but seems like what they do in NL and we do a lot of warmbood on thoroughbred dams since we have a lot of thoroughbred here. The KWPN has always said they think the TB should come down from the top side. Personally I like the 1/4 TB and you can look at the warmbloods and see how much TB blood your horse really has on horsetelex.
We have a young stallion Dante MG (Chin Chin - Glenridge) that is producing some young event horses. He did some jumping but now have with a dressage rider. We shall see how they do in the eventing world as the babies get older but not a lot of them out there. Not proven though.
Corland I like for jumpers and hunters. Your mare is bred nice for the eventing. I’d go with something that is more towards eventing. You can also talk to the owner of Orestus and see what others with Orestus mares might be crossing with to make good eventers.
Any pictures of your mare?
Kathy
Are there a lot of TB stallions currently competitive in the top ranks of eventing?
I did not say anything against H-Ekwador’s own performance. I say his offspring have done zero to nada and I believe you shouldn’t offer an elite predicate to a stallion whose offspring yet need to prove themselves.
In breeding there’s rarely - if ever - anything like “one size fits all” in regards to stallions. So breeding just anything just because it represents a certain bloodline - in this case Heraldik - most likely won’t bring the breeding forward but instead backwards.
Herald 3 i.e. is both overbuild and come with quite a thick and low set neck. Two traits that makes a horse front heavy. Exterior flaws like the ones mentioned above is something that is quite often seen in the offspring of Heraldik including H-Ekwador who just like Herald 3 also is overbuilt with a thick and low set neck.
And what people seem to forget with Heraldik himself is that his world class eventing offspring like Butt’s Abraxxas (Ingrid Klimke), Butt’s Avedon/Butts Leon (Andreas Dibowski) and Happy Times (Sam Griffihs & Shane Rose) have one thing in common - world class riders. These kind of riders are more likely to take almost any horse to the highest level of the sport than the rest of us. There are other offspring that made it to the current 5* events but with quite average results.
It is a good bloodline but if you want to breed it you better know your mare so you won’t end up with a “lady’s bike” looking kind of horse like the one in the link attached
I feel like I can only appologise for such ludicrous suggestions in that case We havent seen a photo or a description of your mare… So advice wouldnt be based on anything solid to be honest with you, only maintaining a high % of tb blood.
Breeding a guranteed 5* eventer is pretty damn hard…
Good luck finding a stallion that suits 
Check the TK stallion list - I believe they have 2 TB stallions who have competed in Advanced or ** eventing sucessfully and in dressage. You also could look at Hirtentanz, TK.
I don’t follow the Lady’s Bike comment - are you referring to the horse being really lean and that snapshot of a photo not being exactly flattering?
Here’s a few videos of him:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8q8CCwEEJ7A
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhyeZJmr7wk
“Overbuilt” - I haven’t heard this used to describe a horse before so bear with me - does that mean you think his body is too heavy for his legs…?
I am not a fan of the “cart horse neck” that’s become a trend in some WB registries. I’ve yet to see a swan neck rad completely clean and I am the type that thinks morphological extremes bring lots of issues, so I’ll never be the person breeding for extremes here. Keep in mind the brunt of my experience is with TBs and TBs for sport – I’ve seen lots of thick, coarse necks in TBs and I don’t think his is one of them. I do think he needs a specific type of mare, and would breed to him in a heartbeat if I had the right mare… but I don’t :encouragement:
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I think what she mean’s about a “lady’s bike” comment is that the horse has a very long hind leg and a short front leg. Which contributes to the “overbuilt” comment which I think she/ he means is that the horse is built very down hill. I could be wrong though!
The problem in this country is that we rarely actually get to see any of theses stallions in the flesh and not enough offspring to get an idea of what the stallion is contributing to the mix. N=1 or 2 isn’t that meaningful!
I would say a cart horse neck does describe the holsteiner and I am not sure all of them have neck problems. However if you need speed and endurance a lower set neck is a lot more functional just as long as the horse can gallop fairly uphill.
I know the horse I referred to very well and the photo is not an unflattering snapshot, it pretty much shows exactly how he is built including some serious exterior flaws and he is not the only Heraldik offspring with this treat. It doesn’t make them all bad horses but I know few people who would breed a mare looking like this and would never take the chances in breeding a mare with a stallion like this.
Here another photo.
And, the mare had nothing to do with this?
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Some interesting stallions to look into in North America for eventing are Valentino currently number 8 in eventing in the world though you wouldn’t want a mare with too much bone as he tends to add to it so wouldn’t be recommend to lighten a mare. If you look up the German rider Nadine marzahl she has quite a few nice Valentino offspring eventing, he is located in British Columbia, Canada. hirtentanz is another a really interesting young trakehner stallion in North America, he’s the first trakehner stallion in a long time to become approved with holsteiner and hes also approved Oldenburg. He has a few nice eventing offspring on the ground, the most well know is bentleys best ridden by Jessica Phoenix. He is located in Florida
