Holsteiner prepotency

[WBF1]

I didn’t want to hijack another thread with this question so figured I’d start another discussion as there seems to be quite a few knowledgeable Holsteiner breeders on this forum.

I have noticed in many instances that offspring resulting from a Holsteiner (stallion or mare) x “outside registry” horse seem to retain a lot of the Holsteiner characteristics despite their being a “cross”. I am wondering if this is why many breeders cross into this registry as the Holsteiner in general seems to be pretty prepotent as a breeding population. Is this because there is more blood consolidation within the Holsteiner?

Can anyone confirm if this is correct or is there, perhaps another reason for this? I often wonder if this could also one of the reasons why the Dutch have used so much Holsteiner blood in the development of their horses?

[RyTimMick]

[QUOTE=WBF1;6717373]
I didn’t want to hijack another thread with this question so figured I’d start another discussion as there seems to be quite a few knowledgeable Holsteiner breeders on this forum.

I have noticed in many instances that offspring resulting from a Holsteiner (stallion or mare) x “outside registry” horse seem to retain a lot of the Holsteiner characteristics despite their being a “cross”. I am wondering if this is why many breeders cross into this registry as the Holsteiner in general seems to be pretty prepotent as a breeding population. Is this because there is more blood consolidation within the Holsteiner?

Can anyone confirm if this is correct or is there, perhaps another reason for this? I often wonder if this could also one of the reasons why the Dutch have used so much Holsteiner blood in the development of their horses?[/QUOTE]

The answer is through approvals, the Holsteiner community didn’t just approve athletes, they approved athletes that maintained a particular type. What make a holsteiner, is in part its type. When you concentrate this gene, and isolate it, you can maintain it. Many studbooks use Holsteiner’s because of this. It is a breed of unbroken motherlines. Since 1834 those motherlines were numbered and 99% of the mares in Holstein descend to these mares that stood on the marsh back then. Their soil was heavy and deep, and a horse without heart and and a strong hind end/loin would stop working. Although their type has become more modern it is still Holstein. KWPN, OLD, Belgium, Danish, Swedish WB’s will use mares from Holstein. Holstein will not use mares from other studbooks. So their motherlines remain pure, and the genetics that maintain this type is concentrated.

Another example of this is when you breed a Border Collie to another breed, you always see the Border Collie in the pups.

Tim

[capricorn]

In addition to the above, there has been alot of line breeding and also early on, there was some inbreeding. With the breeding stock being carefully chosen for the desired characteristics and undesirable ones being culled, this resulted in a concentration of genes for those characteristics. Thus Holsteiners are prepotent in passing on these genes.

[Ticker]

The excellent posts by RyTimMick and Capricorn are exactly why my breeding mares are between 30 and 50% Holsteiner. I breed for dressage but consider it a huge bonus if the stallion I select has Holsteiner in the dam line.

[WBF1]

Do you have any suggestions on where to best research Holsteiner dam lines?

[stoicfish]

[QUOTE=capricorn;6718407]
In addition to the above, there has been alot of line breeding and also early on, there was some inbreeding. With the breeding stock being carefully chosen for the desired characteristics and undesirable ones being culled, this resulted in a concentration of genes for those characteristics. Thus Holsteiners are prepotent in passing on these genes.[/QUOTE]

That is the other end of it. They took stallions from other groups (Tb’s, AA and SF) and heavily line bred them to the mares. So, genetically speaking there is as much influence from the hand picked sires (not originally Holsteiners) as there is from the mares.
Most of these horses have “other” sire lines over Hol. mares.

http://www.sporthorse-data.com/d?i=544170
http://www.sporthorse-data.com/d?i=253890
http://www.sporthorse-data.com/d?d=Cor+de+la+Bry�re&x=39&y=11
http://www.sporthorse-data.com/d?i=43789

If you follow the mare lines, you see they are very heavily bred to a few stallions, Achill (Tobias), Falb, Ethelbert…and a small handful more.
This horse is typical of the type of breeding you see at that time. http://www.sporthorse-data.com/d?i=536054
So you can see that those sires had a huge impact on the group before they introduced the C’s and L. Those mare lines were, genetically, more represented by those stallions, like Achill, then any other influence. (you will notice that some of those have other influences also, like Tb or even Han)
Notice the date on the last horse, 1940. By the end of the late 1800’s there is many unknowns in the pedigrees. So while they didn’t use outside mares, there has been a ton of outside stallions over the years. To the point that the unbroken mare lines that you see today would have more genetic influence from outside stallions then they would from the original swamp mares. But you have to give them credit for hand picking some great stallions and condensing those genetics into a very successful group.