[QUOTE=EventerAJ;7655060]
Interesting choice, Stoney. May I ask you to elaborate on why you chose Native Ruler? What does he throw? As a fellow member of the exclusive club “I Bred to a Race Horse Sire for My Future Sport Horse” I would love to hear your reasoning and look forward to seeing how your foal turns out!
I’ve never been a big fan of Elusive Quality; I have not found his offspring to be very consistent in type. Some of them are nice (Quality Road), but I’ve seen others who are a bit too low-shouldered, level-topline for my taste (see Smarty Jones, for example…though I know Smarty has sired a few decent sport horses). I get the feeling that EQ is a bit mare-dependent; looking at Native Ruler, as well, he has the look of a Dixieland Band damsire stamp. Nothing wrong with that-- Dixieland Band was a super damsire. :)[/QUOTE]
Picking Native Ruler was a really tough choice for me to go through with. He was only retired in 2012, so his oldest offspring are yearlings I believe. While he has a moderately desirable dosage index for sport, he was a sprinter himself, which isn’t as desirable imo. He had 41 starts over several years and was a multiple stakes race winner. He won over $700,000 at the track proving competitiveness as well as longevity. However, I have no clue how this will translate to sport if at all. Viney was kind enough to look at his pedigree and had complimentary things to say about it as a whole and specifically about Mount Hagen which gave me some confidence.
Despite all of this the reason I bred my mare to him was because he is built very very well. He is uphill with a nice neck and shoulder and is compact through the body. He also moves very well and has a great temperament. I only know this because I was able to spend time with him. If I hadn’t had the opportunity to observe him over time I would not have bred to him based solely on his pedigree or what could be found out about him on paper. I will never have the ability to see him jump or be ridden under saddle since he stands to a good number of race mares and the owner has no need to pursue sporthorse breedings.
Ultimately I have tried with this mare with frozen and fresh for three years and due to some cervical and uterine conformation issues we decided to go live cover and now I have a baby on the way! So while I am super excited that she is in foal, I have to admit that I have tried and tried over years to get her in foal to stallions that are more tried and true for her pedigree. The reason that I have embarked upon this experiment is because I selfishly want to ride and compete one of her foals. As an amateur I am not too concerned with killing the jump for the very top level of sport. I most likely would not have done this breeding if I was wanting to sell this baby commercially.
