I live and die by pedigrees and ALWAYS want to know how something is bred. When I post a horse or pony, I post:
Black Beauty (Son of a Gun x She’s a Beauty, by Handsome). When I go to a show and see something I like, I want to know how it is bred because the chances are I may breed my mare to that stallion or see if I have a mare similar to the dam in question. It’s maddening that so many pedigrees are left out. I’m constantly going to the USEF/search horses page and looking.
Sounds like TB and ASB pedigrees of days gone by:
BIG NAME COLT (BIG NAME SIRE x mare by BIG NAME DAMSIRE)
BIG NAME COLT (BIG NAME SIRE x sister to BIG NAME STALLION)
BIG NAME COLT (BIG NAME SIRE x Mr. Doe’s roan mare)
BIG NAME COLT (THE DOE ARABIAN x mare by THE ------SHIRE BARB)
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For centuries, the female was simply considered the means by which the male perpetuated himself. She was thought to bring nothing to the offspring. The sperm was thought to contain a fully formed creature that just grew in the female.
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As a buyer who prefers to support local breeders I like to see the dam listed. Listing the dam sire as well would be best of both worlds.
You can choose to ignore my post since breeding is way down my list of priorities. But I haven’t purchased a horse over the age of 4 in over 10 years, and most have been weanlings. There are certain stallions that I like, but when I’m standing there looking at a barn full of babies I want to see mom, and I want to see what she’s produced. Her, not her sire.
Now I agree, if I had a mare I was looking to breed and I wanted to quickly see trends than the dam sire would be nice. But again, not that hard to look up.
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By the time a mare is even closely considered a blue hen mare, she is dead or at least no longer breeding. So what you see is the common pedigree, as in my example above. Lord/Ramiro stamm 318d2. Thats how you recognize her. If I am on a field in Germany speaking to the breeder. I ask the breeder about the pedigree, and they will ALWAYS state the pedigree as Sire/D Sire/GDam Sire. You learn pedigree this way, seeing the mares, and their foals and then learning their pedigrees. The sires are never on the farm with them. The breeder only cares about their mares. I am a breeder, and I know the names of my mares, but often the buyers of my horses do not. A mare I lost 2 years ago Calandra. Do you know her by that name? NO you don’t because she only had 10 foals. However, she is by Calando I who happens to be the Dam Sire of Carthago and Canturo and Cascavelle and Lord Calando. Some of the most influential sires from Holstein. Calando I had about 400 foals(back then that was a lot). So you recognize the name as a breeder when you wouldn’t ever have known my mare Calandra. Its about being able to see nics and crosses that you will never see by the names of mares, because they just don’t have enough foals to be statistically relevant. Caletto I/II may have been created by this very concept. The breeder was the cousin of Uwe Bahlmann breeder of Ramiro and Acorado. Uwe Bahlmann Bred the Caracas CdB/Consul beautiful stallion sold to Liz Taylor. His cousin saw this stallion and could have said, Hey, I have a Consul mare at home, let me breed her to Cor de la Bryere. Low in behold 6 years after Caracas the Stallion Caletto I was born. When Caracas was bred no one had even heard of Cor de la Bryere.
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Suppose you knew of a TB mare line that has produced TB stallions successfully used in WB breeding for three or four generations of daughters–many different daughters and daughters of daughters. How would your pedigree pattern ever uncover her?
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I agree with Tim, the proper way is to list the Sire/BM Sire. That said, I would rather see something than nothing. Unfortunately we are behind the rest of the world regarding this but progress is always slow 
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