Can you find listings for five horse you think are even roughly equivalent in type of similar age that sold for half of the prices she’s asking?
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Thank you @Railbird and @CuriosoJorge for your endorsements!
A saavy person was quick to reserve the Small Social I have coming, which is pretty cool. Its nice for people to have confidence in one’s program, I do try very hard to learn from mine and others mistakes, and to make appropriate choices for my mares.
RE: the Topic at hand - DHH Crosses for Jumping
Dutch breeders are progressive in their breeding goals and production, so I feel like if DHH x Jumper was a cross that would be setting the world on fire, we would have already seen it coming out of Holland. I dont see “Jarness” becoming a breeding direction any time soon. 
That being said, there was one Jumper bred colt o/o a Harness line mare that did make it to the 2nd round of the stallion selections last year, but was later dismissed based upon his pedigree- it was not interesting enough for the rest of the KWPN population to put forward to licensing.
We are seeing some breeders use Dressage stallions on their DHH mares, I would say that seems to be more appropriate, if the mare has the conformation and character traits wanted in that direction.
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She has used one particular DHH mare over and over - Hakuna Matata. I found one picture of that mare standing in the aisle… it’s not a conformation photo, but it’s not hard to tell that this mare has an upside down neck… which she seems to pass on to her babies.
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This mare is by a DHH stallion named “Ulandro.” It was easy to find a conformation photo of him. Though I’m sure some aspects of his conformation are great for harness types (I don’t know enough to really evaluate that, but want to give the benefit of the doubt), he does seem to have a bit of an upside down neck… and the neck to shoulder connection? It’s VERY much a harness horse type of conformation…
ANYWAY… I think this is a major reason you see so many upside down necks on her foals. It’s this dam. And the dam sire.
Why is she doing so much ICSI from this mare? It’s a mystery. But Kate seems to love that the mare is almost 18 hands tall and black. Here are two screenshots I grabbed of a video Kate made of this mare cantering around at liberty.
She clearly canters with her giant DHH head held high.
I don’t know about the rest of you, but I have zero desire to ride something that is over 17 hands, has an upside down neck, a giant head, and canters around with that head held high. That just seems …. Needlessly Challenging. And the actual video of the mare cantering? Uhhhhh… no thanks. In all fairness, maybe the mare was being harassed or something. But it’s not a canter that is suited for EITHER dressage OR jumpers. PERHAPS that’s a result of the fact that the mare is a HARNESS HORSE.
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I am quite certain that if I had those babies, fed them and took care of them right, I’d have a big, young, shiny, likely sound and solid horse that would appeal to quite a few people. I think there would be a lot more interested parties and higher price than say with an OTTB, Arab, mustang, etc. This is just my opinion based on my observations of my years in the horse community. I am NOT talking about the upper echelons of elite sport horse as I know nothing about that and I think $40k for those horses is nuts for sure. Obviously this is just my opinion, but I think these babies can have a fine future if they can get away from this person and are taken care of properly.
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I certainly hope so, but the hill is long and steep to overcome conformation-by-committee, malnutrition in utero and since birth.
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Also it seems disingenuous to take screen shots of horses in horrible positions because you can literally do that to any horse. And in the cases when a horse is malnourished and not trained, you have to have some imagination to see what it could become. I think DHH tend to have their training challenges but so do OTTBs, Arabs, heck any breed does and any individual can have their own issues. Like, I’m not supporting this Kate person in any way, I definitely think she needs help and needs to get out of horse ownership, but think the trashing on the horses is just uncalled for
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I am confused, are there photos of these horses offered by their owner where they are in a proper position that was ignored and the person that just posted the ugly shots?
I think not.
They posted what the owner put up bragging about her amazing horses.
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To be fair, someone did grab a screenshot of some very unfortunate moments of the canter off a video. But that mare’s bad moment still left a lot to be desired, even when you are educated and aware that it was a “bad moment”.
But this is what will give me nightmares, and I guarantee some unwitting buyer will look at it and go WOW LOOK AT THAT TROT
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I think that after Totilas hit the dressage world, everyone wanted front legs going every where with little regard for the hind legs. And unfortunately being through with true connection doesnt appear to be as valued in today’s dressage world. So with that in mind, I could see where a person would think a DHH would add that front end action. However, I dont get why these horses are being marketed as hunter nor jumper prospects. A big name stallion does not automatically result in what KS thinks it does.
I also have to add, even though its already been said, these foals who have come from dams with questionable nutrition are being set up for a lifetime of issues not top sport prospects.
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I agree especially since a few posters had no idea people how the KWPN book operates, or that people rode DHH.
The price and what she feels their potential is are nuts, and they need food and care, but they aren’t worthless.
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A gentle poke - it is conformation - not confirmation.
I am sure you know this and were perhaps using Siri or something similar that used the wrong spelling but I thought I would point this out for the benefit of others on this thread that don’t understand the difference.
Think of it this way. - “I can confirm that Ulandro’s conformation is more appropriate for a fancy driving horse than for a jumper.” 
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I just grabbed some quick screen shots. Maybe I could have found better ones, but it was pretty hard. The mare was dashing around in the video. These were the best I could do - the rest were blurry.
Anyone can go look at the video and make up their own minds. The mare canters with a tight back and upright head. That is a challenge for sporthorse disciplines. Kate has posted video of one of her other prolific broodmares - Ivanka - at the canter at liberty in a field.
Again, tight back, very upright head.
Hakuna Matata’s offspring seem to be more loose at the canter in some of the videos Kate shares… but they do seem to inherit this very specific neck. Biomechanics being what they are… this will be challenging for any pursuing a sport horse career.
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Hahaha. Thank you! I will go back and edit for sure.
Autocorrect gets me sometimes… uggh.
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@Railbird and @sixpoundfarm - that is a super handsome animal! And beautifully presented in that photo! Congrats to both of you!
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Thank you! I am very proud of him! This whole thing particularly chaps my ass because I come from a sport background- all the baby warmbloods I knew came from europe. When I bought him in utero I had been on more breeding farms in Holland in my life than in the United States. I just saw his pedigree and it was uncommon here in the states and from a stallion whose offspring I overwhelmingly enjoyed riding and from a mare who produced very well, and I had to have him. I would have bought him if he was born in Holland or Germany or Canada or wherever. The experience I have had has kind of shown me a whole community of North American breeders who are extraordinarily thoughtful about the horses they are producing with young stock that is just as high quality as you’d find in Europe, but disconnected from the end goal because we don’t have a system to get a foal from point A to the end goal like they have in Europe. Then you have Kate who is HIGHLY visible to a lot of trainers and riders in the sport because of her braiding, and they’re seeing the exact kind of worst case scenario that would make them avoid American bred foals. There are some extraordinarly nice babies being born here to breeders who will NEVER get them in front of the trainers who can actually show them at the top levels to the same extent that Kate can, and that’s just… depressing to me.
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Congratulations @Railbird. Look at that kind eye!
And thank you for all the rescue work you have accomplished. Poofy’s story was especially uplifting, even if it hurt in the end.
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Here is Baloubet…while yes, he was a TOP showjumper, but IMO he is an anomaly. My mare inherited Baloubet’s neck/shoulder set and she is downhill and heavy upfront and difficult to ride. And she has Olympic showjumping bloodlines on both sides.
She is breeding DHH to this and expecting a showjumper (I guess?).
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I was trying not to be too blatantly unkind. 
I agree with you. 
Which doesn’t say much for the quality of the puppies.
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Well remember they’re unbroke young horses designed to be English sport horses and not broke riding horses or OTTB. It’s not fair to ask if they would be less/more appealing to people shopping for a totally different market/use/animal.
If I was in the market for a yearling or 2 year old future jumper/dressage/hunter horse-- these would be very unappealing. And that’s her market. You can get much nicer youngstock for those markets for half the price. I cannot imagine anyone seeing one of these foals and even a very average but more traditional in breeding/structure/conformation foal and picking these.
I do hope they get fed, proper care, and find homes and have useful careers. But I think the point you’re missing is that these foals started way behind the eight ball as compared to similar foals because of the choices the breeder made. Not that they’re junk as in “couldn’t be turned around.” I am sure they can. But nobody should be intentionally breeding for horses that COULD overcome the odds. That’s very unfair to the animal. People should be breeding to set horses up for success.
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They have been set up for veterinary issues in the future by improper nutrition in utero and as weanlings and yearlings. Their conformation is not correct.
They might “clean up great” (they’d certainly look better than they do now if they were fed and groomed, they’d have to) but that wouldn’t change their conformation or their predisposition to veterinary issues later on in life from malnutrition.
Fat and shiny or not, poor conformation is poor conformation and their breeding certainly doesn’t make them more valuable than a well bred Thoroughbred or Arabian, far from it.
The world doesn’t need more breeders of poorly conformed stock and that’s what Shearer is.
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