I have been wondering if certain stallions’ offspring sell better than others and which stallions tend to be most popular?
Could breeders chime in if their breeding decisions are based on that or on other facts.
Thanks.
For the jumper foals, it has been my experience that certain mares have offspring that are more marketable rather than the stallion.
That’s like asking who is your favorite actor. There are too many variables. It’s an individual thing and some stallions that are highly promoted or have had alot of success get a potential buyer or mare owner’s attention, but it still depends on their needs, personal taste and the MARE is a huge component in choosing a sire or what she produces. Even though you might really admire a particular stallion, it doesn’t mean at the end of the day, he will be your choice in breeding or buying.
PennyG
I agree with the above and have to add that IMO, it’s more about the actual combination of sire x mare rather than just the sire.
There are stallions that are considered to be ‘foal makers’. Sandro Hit springs to mind. There are others that produce youngsters that are easily overlooked as foals but are lovely once under saddle.
Is that what the OP means?
[QUOTE=Kerole;6994991]
There are stallions that are considered to be ‘foal makers’. Sandro Hit springs to mind. There are others that produce youngsters that are easily overlooked as foals but are lovely once under saddle.
Is that what the OP means?[/QUOTE]
Thank you, Kerole. That is basically what I meant.
I realize that there is more to breeding than just picking a popular stallion but there are some stallions like Sandro Hit, Fidertanz,Feedback e.g. that are considered foal makers and I was wondering when breeders use those stallions, do their foals sell better than others.
Sandro Hit and Furstenball (two off the top of my head) have had top priced foals all over Europe for years now. I suspect if your plan was to sell foals then pick a ‘foal maker’ stallion!
My foals are bred to be sold. Here where the market is close and competitive, it pays to use super-star stallions that everyone is familiar with. From a breeder’s point of view it is always easier to sell pretty foals!
What do you think of Cunningham? What does he bring to the table? Just curious since I love him!
[QUOTE=LuvLHDachshunds;6996504]
What do you think of Cunningham? What does he bring to the table? Just curious since I love him![/QUOTE]
I’ve seen lots of lovely Cunningham babies. I’m not sure how marketable they are as youngsters though. The ones I’ve known were already well under saddle.
Right now for jumpers it seems like Cassall and Balou Du Rouet are VERY hot sires.
[QUOTE=Kerole;6996503]
Sandro Hit and Furstenball (two off the top of my head) have had top priced foals all over Europe for years now. I suspect if your plan was to sell foals then pick a ‘foal maker’ stallion!
My foals are bred to be sold. Here where the market is close and competitive, it pays to use super-star stallions that everyone is familiar with. From a breeder’s point of view it is always easier to sell pretty foals![/QUOTE]
I bet SH will be remembered as a great sire of broodmares. He was bred to some very nice mares and great numbers so his success is somewhat inflated but I think the offspring will show up in the UL more and more. He was a primarily a jumper bred stallion and will add lots to a breeding program.
http://www.chronofhorse.com/forum/showthread.php?404306-OMG-is-USEF-starting-to-see-the-light His offspring are up the levels.
I’m no breeder, but I have certainly seen a lot of horses out of Sandro Hit.
[QUOTE=dreamingofdressage;6996638]
I’m no breeder, but I have certainly seen a lot of horses out of Sandro Hit.[/QUOTE]
OUT OF Sandro Hit??? Amazing!!!
Harvard is quite marketable as well, his foals generally are an easy sale for pretty much any discipline from dressage, to jumping and vaulting and driving… Seriously, he has foals doing everything but flat racing hahaha
I think any dressage breeder who breeds to sell foals pays attention to the fashionable “foal making” stallions. And because most breeders need/want to sell foals you see a handful of newly licensed stallion get used like crazy every year because the market always wants something new and fashionable. For a foal to be marketable for a good price it needs to trot big, be pretty, be the right color and be of fashionable breeding. I can’t help but think this is the case for hunter breeding too considering the success of stallions like Red Wine…pretty and a nice color.
Not to say there aren’t really proven sires that produce very salable foals, because there are ie Don Schufro, Diamond Hit, DeNiro, Jazz ect ect. But for the most part a salable foal comes from a hot, new stallion. I don’t think many people breed to Breitling for example, to breed a foal to sell.
Spot on, Donella…
JMHO, but, this thread really highlights a flaw in the breeding philosophy of this country. Choosing the right stallion for YOUR mare, in order to achieve an improvement in the resulting foal should be the goal. If you can achieve this, you should have a marketable result, and hopefully improve upon the next generation of breeding stock. Just because a hot young stallion has one super performance as a 3-year old, is a cool color, generates a lot of hype, doesn’t mean he should be bred to your mare.
At that point, no-one really knows how he will produce or what kind of mare he actually needs. Jumping in too quickly, before anyone even knows what he can produce is really risky. Fashion breeding is tempting for sure, a pretty black horse with 4 whites or a nice palomino catches people’s attention. Just won a big class somewhere, but was never on the radar before last week?? Forking over extravagant breeding fees for an unproven stallion just because he’s the latest buzz on the internet – not for me, but again, JMHO. I guess the question you have to ask yourself is, “am I trying to breed the best horse possible, or just the one I think will sell the quickest?”
[QUOTE=TKR;6994870]
That’s like asking who is your favorite actor. There are too many variables. It’s an individual thing and some stallions that are highly promoted or have had alot of success get a potential buyer or mare owner’s attention, but it still depends on their needs, personal taste and the MARE is a huge component in choosing a sire or what she produces. Even though you might really admire a particular stallion, it doesn’t mean at the end of the day, he will be your choice in breeding or buying.
PennyG[/QUOTE]
Agreed! :yes: It only depends on getting the right bowl of genes for an ideal foal.
[QUOTE=carnivalhill;6997372]
JMHO, but, this thread really highlights a flaw in the breeding philosophy of this country. Choosing the right stallion for YOUR mare, in order to achieve an improvement in the resulting foal should be the goal. If you can achieve this, you should have a marketable result, and hopefully improve upon the next generation of breeding stock. Just because a hot young stallion has one super performance as a 3-year old, is a cool color, generates a lot of hype, doesn’t mean he should be bred to your mare.
At that point, no-one really knows how he will produce or what kind of mare he actually needs. Jumping in too quickly, before anyone even knows what he can produce is really risky. Fashion breeding is tempting for sure, a pretty black horse with 4 whites or a nice palomino catches people’s attention. Just won a big class somewhere, but was never on the radar before last week?? Forking over extravagant breeding fees for an unproven stallion just because he’s the latest buzz on the internet – not for me, but again, JMHO. I guess the question you have to ask yourself is, “am I trying to breed the best horse possible, or just the one I think will sell the quickest?”[/QUOTE]
But Europe is the worst at the new stallion bandwagon. When you see young stallions with huge numbers, it isn’t NA that made those choices (we don’t even have that many mares).
Yes, Europe does jump on the new stallion bandwagon, but they have a much different mare base than we do, and different reasons for doing it. They have generations upon generations of breeding info to draw upon. Their mare base is very deep, where here often (there are plenty of exceptions I know) there may not be any knowledge of the mare, other than what they see standing in front of them. Europeans know how their mares produce and with what lines. Everything is well documented, they have generational knowledge to draw upon. Breeding isn’t just a hobby there as is most often the case here. They have the systems in place to develop what they produce and market them. The big European breeding farms will try on the “newcomers” as they produce foals in numbers, and can afford to take a calculated risk. Sometimes they just want/need to infuse some new blood into the genetic pool of their particular program. For me, the goal is always to produce a top quality horse, not a quick sale because of name recognition that comes from the flavor of the week. Off the soapbox now, just my opinion
Good post, Carnivalhill. And I will add that breeders in Europe also usually tend to put their proven mares to the younger stallions. They have already bred these mares several times and have a good feel for what they produce, plus, as you mentioned, they know the mare’s family very well - often have (or at least know) her mother, grandmother, sisters, etc., so are fairly confident on how the lines produce, and with what type of stallions. The younger mares, by contrast, often go to the more proven stallions until the breeder has several foals from them and gets a sense for how they produce.
