Mark Todd's Aberjack

[Sannois]

And have for years! Felt I had to chck in on this one. I am not a breeder, nor do I presently own a mare. However the two horsemen that I have always looked up to, are Denny Emerson, and Mark Todd. I own everything every taped or Printed by Mark, and have learned so much from his writings. I wouldn not say I have an exceptional eye for a horse, as some of the examples of What Mark looks for in his prospects were not exceptionally pretty to me, noted in his book Novice Eventing. But when I first layed eyes on a pic of Aberjack jumping, I was blown away, That was what an eventer should look like, and pairing the two best horsemen to bring a superb stallion to the states was a great move in my book. If I had a mare I would want to breed her to one of Dennys stallons. The Emersons are a wonderful pair, and have been and still are such a strong and wonderful influence in the eventing world. I have longed to have the opportunity to ride with Denny, and vow to someday before I’m to old to do just that. I personally have always felt that we in the US need to continue to strive for the American sport horse, The TB! And keep the blood here, and improve it. Like I said I am no one in particular, but a middle aged Novice eventer, on a middle aged TB. I am continually surprised by the fact that some people always have something not so positive to say about some wonderful horseman. Someone said they wished we would all use our real name on here… I believe it was Evalee Hunter, I have no problem with that, Kim Horan

“Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety” Benjamin Franklin, 1755
Founding member of The Fossils over Fences Clique!

[JER]

Maybe Archie has some photos of Aberjack’s foals?!

We’re still waiting…

[Gry2Yng]

Very nice Salute the Truth baby. I am the one who posted about his terrible video. In no way did I mean ANY disrespect to the horse. Just agreeing with the comment that Americans are very “TV” focused. You had to get past the production issues of the video and really try hard to compare the stallions and not the way the stallions were presented.

[poltroon]

<BLOCKQUOTE class=“ip-ubbcode-quote”><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by rebecca:
What if you read that Mark Todd had publicly stated that your horse looked like he was made of spare parts, or looked like three horses in one, and he couldn’t understand what you thought was so great about your horse? What if you knew that Mark had never seen your horse go in dressage, had never seen him jump so much as a cross rail, yet felt free to denigrate him in print?
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
Hee! Frankly, I’d be honored that he deigned to notice my little mare, let alone comment on her shortcomings!

[system]

The PHR was way too narrow a concept, because it was tied to at least half tbs. A top event horse sire might be a full warmblood.I believe Galoubet has sired some Badminton horses, and he wouldn`t have been eligible under that old format. Our country needs some kind of much more INclusive registry.
Bonfire

[JER]

Catherston Dazzler is 5/8ths TB, 1/8 Gelderlander (Dutch carriage horse), 1/8 Gronigen (Dutch WB, stud book combined with Gelderlander book to create KWPN) and 1/8 RID (from his dam Welton Gameful, an advanced eventer).

This makes my filly 13/16ths TB, although you’d never guess it when you see her turned out with the racing-bred TBs. She’s much bigger than everyone else. She does, however, have a fantastic ground-covering gallop.

Choosing Dazzler was relatively simple. He looks like a masculine version of my mare, built a little more on the vertical axis than her, a little less refined through the shoulder and neck and quite a bit stouter all around. The worst combination of these two horses’ conformation would still be a nice horse.

I did visit Catherston and saw Dazzler, or ‘Darkie’, in person. He’s a real powerhouse of a horse, he does piaffe/passage/tempi changes with little effort, even after a winter out in the field. While there, I saw a number of his offspring (several were in for training), including one out of a pony mare and another out of ‘an unbelievably hideous mare’ – this mare belonged to a friend of theirs and she begged them to let her breed to Dazzler. The result was a decent horse. I also saw his full sister, who is one of their top broodmares, and his half-brother Dutch Gold.

Catherston has spent over 50 years developing a type of horse that is meant to be a good all-around sport horse. The stallions do at least both SJ and dressage, if not eventing as well. The stallions hack out regularly, are extremely well mannered and work in the ring with mares/geldings/whatever, they just have to cope. This is a true breeding PROGRAM, which is not so easy to find in this country.

[Fred]

<BLOCKQUOTE class=“ip-ubbcode-quote”><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by SuperSpike:

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Anne:
It would be lovely if Denny’s stallions had gotten the start that JER described as part of Catherston’s “program”. However, with the exception of Aberjack and Wintry Oak, Denny’s stallions were racehorses, and began their careers at stud standing to that market. Their oldest foals are racehorses. It is hardly fair to judge their first few crops, bred to race out of racehorse mares, for not producing the eventing world’s latest phenom! .<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Most event horses in North America were not bred to be event horses, but to be race horses. These horses, whether they made it to the track or not, or were relatively successful on the track or not, then went on to be event horses. But bred to be race horses. In my experience, few people in North America even yet, are breeding specifically for eventing talent.
To illustrate my point a bit further: the TB stallions best known for producing jumping talent - the Nearco line (didn’t D.E call him the Horse of the Century?) his great son Nasrullah, his great son Bold Ruler, his great son Bold Bidder, his great son Spectacular Bid, Royal Charger, his son Turn-to, his son Sir Gaylord, Double Jay, My Babu etc etc. All of these horses were bred to be race horses, and bred to produce race horses. Nothing else. And they were great racehorses and great racehorse stallions.
It is only as these offspring come off the track and into the show ring that these stallions become known as sporthorse producers. To that end, I would imagine that there should be quite a few offspring by the stallions discussed above, since they all stood as racehorse stallions first. And since they were not outstanding as racehorse stallions, it would be expected that a higher percentage of their offspring would not have gone to the breeding shed, but instead to the riding horse market. So actually there should be quite a few of them around by now.
I’m sorry to see this discussion get people so riled, but
hat being said, what is great about this discussion, is that it means that people are starting to realize that if you want great event horses, like Britain, you have to breed for them. That doesn’t mean that great event horses don’t come off the track. Off course they do. But that is often a lucky set of circumstances. But when people make intelligent breeding decisions, looking and selecting for certain qualities (speed, courage, jumping ability, movement ) we can only increase our chances of producing individuals who can excel in this discipline and whose long term soundness won’t already be compromised to some degree or another by a racing career. That bodes well for the future of eventing in North America.
I am speaking as one of those ‘other’ people who steadfastly breed Thoroughbreds as sport horses, who stands a Thoroughbred stallion (who is also being bred to specifically to produce event horses) and believe in them as the supreme athletes of the horse world.

There is no one and only stallion, but if we as breeders, keep selecting and breeding the best to the best, we’ll produce great horses. Adding some outside blood, such as C.D. can only be a good thing. His daughters will eventually be bred, and so on…

[Jair]

<BLOCKQUOTE class=“ip-ubbcode-quote”><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Greenbean:
I just think that before saying that they don’t have any successful offspring you should take the next step and inquire about it. No need to give false information to the public.

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Greenbean, I think it depends on what your idea of “successful” offspring entails. As Evalee stated above, to her it means that a stalllion promoted as an eventing sire would have offspring that are successful at the three and four star level.

To others, a successful stud might mean that he constantly produced easy to handle all-rounders who were good at lower level h/j, dressage and eventing. Every individual has their own idea of what success means.

As for false information, I don’t think Evalee said anything wrong - there is no indication that any of the Emerson’s lovely studs have produced a 3 or 4 star eventer, because if they had, why on earth wouldn’t that be the first thing you see on the website? I would imagine that is something a stud owner would promote

In more generic terms, I agree with the other posters above who mentioned that seeing cute pics of foals on a stallion’s brochure/video/website doesn’t mean a whole heck of a lot. That always bugs me in the different stallion edition magazines! There are studs who have been around for years and years, yet the owner never shows pics of offspring under saddle! why? I never got that

(ps. the sire of Messiah and Delta was Aberlou xx, the same sire of Aberjack I’d love to see a video of him jumping - after reading Mark Todd’s description of him in his autobiography, he sounded incredible.)

[Erin]

I was going to add something about the PHR, but I think I’ll just start a new thread.

[Heather]

And I think you’ve missed my point JER. I don’t want you to feel guilty about breeding your mare to anybody–you should abcsolutely love everything about the baby–because you’ve brought it into the world and it’s yourreponsibility now, so I hope that baby is absolutely everything you dreamed of.

What I wanted you (and others, the collective you, really) was to examine WHY you felt you had to go overseas. I myself agreed with you,and called our current breeding programs “embryonic,” but my point is they will remain embryonic if we don’t support them. And I have no problem with bringing in foreign bloodlines–we US sportbreeders have screwed it up a bit, and while the best European bloodlines do feature American TB names, they have utilised them to a far better degree than we have. Breed the best at home you say, here, here, I agree, I say.

The key now is though, is that along with brining inthe bloodlines, is to utilise and bind them up with our own programs, so that in time, we won’t have to go overseas, because they’ll be right here. Aberjack isn’t an American TB, or even a full TB, but when he is crossed with good American TB mares, his offspring will strnegthen our American sport programs. Again, I have NO problem with foreign horses, non-Tb horses, etc.–I have ridden and loved them all over the years, BUT as long as we re willing to spend our money overseas in perpetuity, rather than psening some of it there now with the future plan of NOT spending more of it over there in the future, well, there will always be something to complain about.

I still think you seem to be harboring a lot of anger and negativity against the tamarack organization, which I find strage, but it may just be the “internet translation” and I’ll chalk it up to that.

[system]

There is an old saying about jumping sires,“They get famous about 20 minutes before they die.”
Think about the time frame. Assume a stallion has to go out and prove himself as a competing athlete,because who wants to breed to a non athlete. This means the stallion is usually about 9 or 10 years old before you really know what he can do, especially in eventing, show jumping or dressage(grand prix level).
Now at some point, the horse starts to breed. If he starts breeding at 9, say, hes 10 before his 1st babies are born. Usually breeders dont breed tons of mares the 1st couple of years to a new stallion, because he isnt established yet. Also, the very top mares are usually going to the older, more well established stallions, so down the line you will see there is a double whammy in effect. By the time those 1st couple of crops are 6, 7, or 8 years old, which is when we really begin to know their records, the stallion is a mid to late teenager. Now, as he approaches his 20s, his popularity starts to build, but unless hes a Seattle Slew or a Mr. Prospector, his days are numbered.
That`s why breeders stress the performance record of the stallion, the success of his relatives, and, yes, the cuteness of those foals, so breeders give the stallion a chance.
Even Storm Cat, who stands for 500,000.dollars, has only about 16 per cent stakes winners. In other words, 84 per cent of the foals of the most expensive stallion in the world are considered failures by their breeders! Is it any wonder that so few stallions get many mares?
Great stallions are almost always horses which were from top families, and who were also top athletes. But the number that are recognized as such in the non racing disciplines, where they have to be 9 or 10, usually, before they hit their maturity and peak, is very rare.
How many advanced event stallions have advanced event babies, and are still fertile, or for that matter, are still alive?
Bonfire

[deltawave]

I have a book that features the Catherston horses, and he’s just beautiful.

BTW, a non-gray horse can never, EVER produce a gray unless they are BRED to a gray. So breeding a non-gray to CD is safe–no grays.

What was CD’s stud fee, BTW? Frozen semen, I presume?

“If you think your hairstyle is more important than your brain, you’re probably right.” Wear a helmet!
www.deltawave.homestead.com
www.seeliecourt.homestead.com

[Greenbean]

<BLOCKQUOTE class=“ip-ubbcode-quote”><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Jair:

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

As for false information, I don’t think Evalee said anything wrong - there is no indication that any of the Emerson’s lovely studs have produced a 3 or 4 star eventer, because if they had, why on earth wouldn’t that be the first thing you see on the website? I would imagine that is something a stud owner would promote

I think saying that none of the studs have any famous offspring is false information Jair. And if you read my post earlier I did say that the website was not helpful when it came to giving off the names of those babies. I feel like that statement was a false fact. Anyway, no need to beat a dead horse…I really just wanted to see pictures. We could all spend weeks discussing what we felt classified a horse as “successful” but then again, there would be no point. Thanks for trying to clarify though Jair, much appreciated!

yeah I would love to see the video of Aberlou too!! I heard she’s AMAZING!

[Evalee_Hunter]

& it’s an unusual one. Actually, I think everyone on the bulletin board should use his/her real name, but what I think is irrelevant in regard to name use.

Rebecca, I think most real horsepeople are more critical of their own horses than anyone else could ever be . . . so I doubt anyone has said anything that Mark Todd & Denny Emerson haven’t thought themselves long ago about these horses. I certainly call our horses pet names such as “Miss Lumpy Legs” & I’m quite accurate in my descriptions. If you came & said Mary (my daughter’s favorite mare) has a big belly, no topline, splints, bowed tendons & a few other things, we would shrug & say, “Yup, you’re right. Good powers of observation”. You would NOT hurt our feelings because you would be absolutely correct. When you know a horse intimately, you know its shortcomings as well as its strong points.

I don’t see how eventers could help but love American TBs–they make excellent, world class event horses. Phillip Dutton, who competes for Australia, rides American TBs such as House Doctor.

The stallion I mention in my signature line (a stallion owned by a friend of mine) is an excellent example of an American TB that came through the same proving ground as Loyal Pal, the race track. He does not have the same bloodlines, but he does have excellent conformation & demonstrated heart & soundness. We have bred to him.

Still, I have to say, I (along with many other breeders) am always looking for “a better mousetrap” &, worldwide, there are very few stallions that have proven themselves in eventing & then have proven they can pass that talent on to their offspring.

Denny Emerson does not stand a single stallion who has both attributes. That is a fact. Furthermore, one stallion that DOES possess both attributes is much cheaper to breed to than many other stallions, for example Loyal Pal. It seems to make sense to me to breed to such a stallion, not as a criticism of American breeders or American horses or American bloodlines but simply because who can argue with success?

Catherston Dazzler is licensed as an AMERICAN WARMBLOOD. That’s right, he is licensed by AWR! Does that make him all right, now that he has American in his name?

Geez, what a supersensitive bunch.

www.rougelandfarm.com Home of TB stallion Alae Rouge, sire of our filly Rose, ribbon-winner on the line at Dressage at Devon.

[system]

Thanks, Mark Todd, for your letter about Aberjack and the Aberlou line(posted on the thread about Aberlou photos). Its nice to get some straight talking about this horse, as there has been a great deal of speculation, and even criticism, often coming from people who had not even seen the horse.Im afraid that may be an American trait, to think we`re all experts about everything! Would you ever consider coming to the states to do a clinic, one aspect of which might be a sport horse breeding seminar?
Bonfire

[JER]

Yikes.

Becca writes:<BLOCKQUOTE class=“ip-ubbcode-quote”><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>JER, Who are you ?

I repeat my question JER, what are your qualifications to knock Aberjack in print? Have you ridden him, like both Mark and Karen O`Connor have, and who rave about him? Have you seen him jump, or be ridden? Have you seen any of his first crop foals in the U.S. this year?Have you seen him do ANYTHING? Have you ever even seen HIM?
Before you can knock the credibility of a horse, or, by association,of the people who own and support him, perhaps it would be a good idea to have valid qualifications to do so. I repeat, how many gold medals do YOU have?
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Well, Becca, why does it matter who I am? I’m a member of this BB, I’m a horse person, I own one TB mare who I event and breed by embryo transfer.

When I said there were things I didn’t like about Aberjack, I thought it was fairly clear that I was was describing what I saw in his conformation photo. The conformation photo is a promotional shot of the stallion – the owners want you to see this so that you’ll consider him for breeding. In making that consideration, a discerning mare owner will look at that photo and analyze how that stallion is put together. There is nothing wrong or emotionally loaded about critiquing a conformation photo. It can be the undisputed best #1 mega stallion in the world and a mare owner can say, “I don’t favor horses that are so short-coupled or I don’t like the way his head is set.” This is not knocking a stallion’s ‘credibility’ at all.

I’ve never ridden Aberjack and never claimed to. However, I do think it’s definitely in his favor that BBers who have ridden him really like him. I’m not knocking his connections, either. I admire Mark Todd, and like I said, Aberjack does come from a fantastic line of eventers. I also said I liked Mark Todd’s other stallion, Mayhill, who I have seen in person.

I have no gold medals (not even Gold Medal Flour!), but I’m not sure how a gold medal alone would make anyone a better judge of horseflesh or breeding. And frankly, I’d respect KOC, DOC and Mark Todd just as much if they didn’t have any gold medals to their names. They are all class acts.

Heather, I did not feel I HAD to go overseas. I simply looked for the best stallion choice for my mare. I don’t think of the world as Us vs. Them – I’m a Europe-born US citizen and I’m as comfortable in Europe and Asia as I am here. Actually, I’m thrilled that with modern technology, going overseas is an option and we can bring foreign bloodlines into this country without shipping the entire stallion.

As for Tamarack/Denny, I harbor no ill will. I think it’s great that they promote their stallions. I think it’s great they stand TBs. But $2500 for Loyal Pal is a lot of money, especially when I haven’t seen many babies of his except for the few photos on the web site. If they can fill his book at that price, great, but it is a bit outside my budget. Dazzler’s fee is GBP700, which is $1095 at today’s rate.

And tle, I don’t discount US horses. I recently bought the-kid-of-whom-I’m-guardian a horse to do the upper levels with. We (her grandma and I, as we’re her sole means of support and I’m not even related) had discussed how much we could spend and where to look, etc., and NZ and the UK looked like more cost-effective options. However, I found a talented, green OTTB about 100 miles east of LA and I am quite proud of our young Cal-bred who started jumping in June, won several classes at an A jumper show in Sept and did his first Novice HT last weekend.

[Greenbean]

I suppose different people find different qualities in horses attractive or unattractive…anyway, if there are any jacko baby pics out there please post! thanks so much!!

[Evalee_Hunter]

I think we’d all like to see that picture.

www.rougelandfarm.com Home of TB stallion Alae Rouge, sire of our filly Rose, ribbon-winner on the line at Dressage at Devon.

[Ridge_Runner]

Very interesting conversation we’re having especially since I’m very serious about breeding my mare this upcoming spring. I’m not familiar with Dazzler and hope someone knows a link to him. He’s an Irish Draught? Color? I do not like grays…just my personal foible but having had to clean them up as a groom years ago, I developed a real aversion. Yeah, I know 50% with a brown mare like mine but those are betting odds.

Anyway, would a discussion about eventing stallions be complete without discussing Erin Go Bragh? I’m particularly interested in him since my mare is half Connemara, her foal could be registered with the Part Connemara registry as well not to mention his impressive eventing record. He also is a proven event sire with several get competing at the top levels of eventing…Tilly Go Bragh and Gaelic Holiday come to mind off hand. I’d love to see any pics of his babies if anyone has any or info on temperments, etc…

The Denny Mystique…I have to give him a lot of credit for standing sound, athletic TB stallions in a time when many have moved to the WB. It’s nice to see such a lovely lineup of stallions with performance records and racing backgrounds and proven toughness. Soundness is a trait that can’t be ignored by breeders and so many mares that get bred are because they are unsound. I hope someone can post some pics of Aberjacks or Wintry’s babies. I’m very curious to see how they turned out.

“I never saw a wild thing sorry for itself.” D.H. Lawrence

[tle]

Evalee & JER… I think you misunderstood me. YOU are not the people I get irritated about… the ones that do their homework and simply find the stallion that works best for them across the pond. The ones that bug me are those who automatically assume if it’s American anything (horse, car, instructor, whatever), it must be A) Cheap and B) not worth their time. Those people automatically assume that if it comes from abroad and/or has an accent it’s better WITHOUT checking into the background or investigating ALL their options. Like Heather, if you find what you’re looking for elsewhere, fine! I’m thrilled for you that you found the best match!

<BLOCKQUOTE class=“ip-ubbcode-quote”><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Catherston Dazzler is licensed as an AMERICAN WARMBLOOD. That’s right, he is licensed by AWR! Does that make him all right, now that he has American in his name?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

heehee… actually AWR means LESS to me. Don’t get me wrong, I think he’s a gorgeous hunk of man, but having known some AWB people in the past and how pushy they were with the AWB “label”, I tend to roll in laughter at that “definition” (which I knew their mare and she was a Mutt, plain and simple).

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If Dressage is a Symphony… Eventing is Rock & Roll!!!

“All’s well that ends with cute E.R. doctors, I always say.” – Buffy