I thought this discussion was about “people-oriented” horses.
Trainability (to any desired response) and athletic ability (aka “talent”) for the discipline one has bred are for are separate issues. The latter IME is clearly genetic.
Regardless, there are still those with bad tempered, unridable mares who will breed them to brilliant looking nasty stallions, and expect better. :mad:
Yep. Broodmares should be chosen very wisely, IMO. They’re the cornerstone of a really good breeding program.
Nature vs Nuture
I have 4 foals from 2007 my GP mare. 3 via embryo transfer and one she carried and raised herself.
All 4 have different dispositions based mostly on the input from the mare who raised them.
The one that had the calm, confident, easy Mom is the most pleasant, confident and easy. As a foal she was quite the pain although she outgrew it at about 4 months old. The one that had the GP mare carry and raise her is in most ways exactly like the dam.
I have also had 3 foals that for some reason did not like to be touched or handled at all by people up until they were about 3 yrs old. Suddenly they started coming around and turned into very friendly easy horses. All of my foals are pretty much raised the same way and by the same people. The dams to these three were also exceptionally people oriented but seemed to all have different dispositions from each other.
