UPDATE: The most beautiful embryo I've ever seen! A pony Totilas!!! NEW - PICTURES

[foxcreek]

First of all, I would like to assure everyone that I did not make the decision to do this lightly. And I am not making light of anyone’s concerns regarding the potential for problems with the foaling. And, I also assure everyone that I am not doing this with callous disregard for my mares’ safety. As I mentioned earlier, I have in fact witnessed a horrific foaling in which the foal became hip-locked on the mare’s pelvis. It took two grown men, the university vet & my husband, twisting & pulling to get that colt free, the colt died in my arms and all three of us were covered in blood. The mare initially survived but had damaged the nerve that runs through the pelvic girdle, a situation that is fairly common in cattle but very rare in horses. We spent several thousand dollars trying to save her life. The university had her in a padded ICU stall in a harness to lift her up and down. She would become panicked because she couldn’t get up on her own. 1 week after the foaling she panicked and was thrashing around, and broke her neck. This breeding was a normal sized warmblood mare with 7 previous uneventful & successful foalings who was bred to a normal sized warmblood stallion.

So I know full well what heartbreaking, horrific foalings are like, and its not something I ever want to experience. So, I do not do this lightly with no knowledge of how awful foalings can become. And after witnessing that horrific mess I knew right then and there that if I couldn’t handle that kind of thing I didn’t belong in the breeding business.

I LOVE, LOVE my mares. I can guarantee that these will NOT be unattended foalings. I live literally 5 minutes down the road from the university veterinary hospital and am friends with the clinicians and residents and they will all be on high alert! I will be watching my mares carefully throughout their entire pregnancy. But I don’t feel that what I’m doing is terribly cruel and unusual and unheard of. As I said before, everything I’ve personally experienced, read about, heard about convinces me that its not significantly more dangerous than any other foaling.

It is very possible that I won’t get what I’m hoping for, and as VirginaBred said it could well turn out to have all the wrong pieces and parts and be quite fugly. It could just as easily turn out to be quite nice. But I think that can be said for any cross breeding, and actually that could also be said for ANY breeding, although obviously the potential is higher with cross breedings. However, as I stated earlier, one German breeder, Mr. Ellers, has been doing this for years with Constantin and if he had consistently gotten weird looking hony’s with short legs and big ugly heads or something I think he would have stopped doing it.

I’m often asked, “How did you get started breeding the GRP’s?” Well, what I discovered was that I had more FUN working with the smaller horses and ponies. I had more FUN!!! It was WORK handling those big 16.2-17 hand horses and it wasn’t FUN!!! Well, that’s why I love my horses they are fun and awesome, and make me laugh and smile, and take my breath away with their beauty and athleticism. But why should all the big horse peeps get to have all the excitement!! When I saw Totilas with Edward Gal I was just like everyone else: blown away with chills down my back and goose bumps on my arms!!! Was it training? Breeding? Unnatural freakish talent never to be duplicated? I don’t know - but I do know I only live one life and I’ll be damned but I’d sure like to try to get that awesomeness in a small package!!! Wooooo, dang I get chills just thinkin about it!!! Might work, might not - but I’d sure like to give it a try.

I haven’t tried breeding Circe yet this spring, but I have been watching her very closely and she’s just now starting to come out of being transitional. But, Jack Sparrow was 3’ Jumper Champion this weekend at Prince George’s Equestrian Center in Maryland!!! YAY!!!

[Kenike]

It’s not the difference in hands that concerns me, but the difference in bone WITH the height. Totilas is big, he has a lot of bone. The mare with pictures is pretty fine. It just…well, it concerns me.

I do wish you luck and am anxious to see these babies, though. You are obviously excited you have at least one on the way after such extensive planning. I love seeing that!

[Ticker]

I hope it all works out and you have a safe and successful foaling!

I have no experience breeding pony mares but my initial reaction was one of concern as well. I know how easy it is to have problems when breeding a smaller mare to a large stallion, I lost a big colt that way. We saved the mare but ultimately our horses pay the price for our decisions.
Good luck to you.

[honeylips]

For me it’s an interesting theory - but one that my german pony breeder friends would wonder about. There are MANY GRPs available now with all the power and flashy movement like Totilas - but in the correct size and temperament that is the aim of the GRP. To try to find this extravagant movement - for me - you don’t to go as far afield as Totilas. Stallions like Dimension, Caramel, Dreidimensional, Nemax and many others produce tons and tons of movement. Knees to ears and all.

I do have a pony mare from Mr Ellers that is a product of his breeding plan and she is lovely but my GRP breeder friends were still surprised I bought her. I will have to be quite careful in size when breeding her as she will most likely end up 15 hands ish. She was placed top 5 in the German Foal Championships in Lienen and of super high quality and is the sister to Cinderella - Euro FEI pony champion. But that was a hard fought choice and I got a whopping big boatload of eye rolling from my very successful GRP breeder buddies!
For me having seen Totilas as a young horse, adult horse and many offspring - he is an “end product” thus far IMHO so perhaps that colors my opinion as well. He is also pretty well known for being a real “pro” ride and intimidating for Gal at the beginning as well. Not really the temperament I would be looking for in a pony breeding plan. But that’s me.
With my mares and stallions I want all that movement but with a temperament that is suitable for children and lady riders (same as the GRP societies goals). I can’t reconcile Totilas with that goal.
I did see a lovely Mr Mobility/Damon Hill foal last year that I strongly considered. That dam was 15.3ish and sire 13.3 ish. But that follows more with the german tradition when going this route of using a small pony on a large mare - so you don’t end up with the mismatched size concerns.

[mbm]

i would love to of seen the Mr Mobility/Damon Hill! I really like both of those lines…

I bred my mare to a brother of Mr Mobility - Manchester City - cant wait to see the result.

I think it is going to be awesome to have lots of ponies/honies around

[honeylips]

the Mr Mobility/Damon Hill - was a super mover. But unfortunately very crooked legs, so I had to pass. I was also told i had NO hopes of getting him licensed ever due to the bloodlines. The Weser Ems and Hanoverian ponies, on occaision, will license a pony/wb cross, but only very rarely. The Westfalen/Nord Rhine usually won’t license them. Too much unpredictability in the future with the height. Interesting to note that NRW are the predominant pony studbooks in Germany not Weser Ems. We just mostly know Weser Ems here.

[Donella]

It sounds like you have given lots of thought to these breedings as you sound like a very conscientiousness breeder. Congrats on the embryo!

[goodpony]

This has been a very interesting thread–good luck Foxcreek-hope you get your dream ponies!

Examples include the Strahlmann, 155cm (Oldenburg by Sandro Hit / Weltmeyer / Busoni xx); Quader, 160cm (Oldenburg by Quaterback / Glöckner / Adamo I); the pinto stallion Showtime AS, 158 cm (Oldenburg by Sevillano xx / Uniek / Ico); Quatman, 153cm (Holsteiner by Quintero / Caretino);

was curious if there were links to these stallions? Or somewhere I might take a look at them?

[Ibehorsepoor]

I just want to say that I bred a small wb mare that had previously had 4 foals all by different wb stallions… no one under 16.2 but none over 17hh… I bred her to Benetton Dream… would have lost both. huge foal… had to pull and it was not an easy pull… I have always believed that it is the size of the uterous… Well in this particular case that was wrong. I wish you luck with your foalings and would love to see those pony babies…

[mbm]

[QUOTE=goodpony;6974580]
This has been a very interesting thread–good luck Foxcreek-hope you get your dream ponies!

was curious if there were links to these stallions? Or somewhere I might take a look at them?[/QUOTE]

Strahlemann
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9njM3D8nMrg&feature=relmfu
http://www.gratis-webserver.de/GabyHeemsoth/2_1_2.html

he was one of the ones I researched…

[mbm]

For Quader I found this:

http://zuechterforum.com/zf/de/news/ergebnisse-der-zfdp-koerung-wietzendorf-.html
http://www.zfdp.de/images/stories/Ergebnisliste_Wietzendorf_Krung_2012.pdf

Showtime AS
http://www.eurohengststation-smidt.de/showtime-as.html

[goodpony]

thanks for the links!

[hluing]

I think this is a very interesting cross although I don’t think I would have had the nerve to do it myself However, more and more of these and other types of crosses are being made and they are very interesting.
It is true that this would not have been considered the thing to do by many GRP breeders in Germany. However, what I have found in over a decade of breeding GRP’s in the US is that the US market is very different from the German one. I resisted the WB cross for many years based on what my German contacts advised, but it has turned out to be my most requested “pony” in the US market. I tried it first with welsh stallion to WB mare and although they resulting foals were lovely, they did not compare to the corss I did this year by my GRP stallion, Burberry to a Rubin Royal x Donnerhall mare. https://www.facebook.com/#!/media/set/?set=a.10151309320061680.1073741827.110190181679&type=3
This colt is really all I had hoped for. No parts that don’t match here! I had a hunch Burbery would cross great on WB mares since he himself is line bred to Constantin.

Anyway, thank goodness there are more than one way to do things and seldom is only one way the “right” way. I wish Foxcreek the best of luck and it will be a very interesting cross for sure.

[foxcreek]

Honeylips, Please don’t think I’m being argumentative or difficult. I think this conversation is very, very interesting. So please don’t take my comments the wrong way, but I don’t understand this statement:

For me it’s an interesting theory - but one that my german pony breeder friends would wonder about. There are MANY GRPs available now with all the power and flashy movement like Totilas - but in the correct size and temperament that is the aim of the GRP. To try to find this extravagant movement - for me - you don’t to go as far afield as Totilas. Stallions like Dimension, Caramel, Dreidimensional, Nemax and many others produce tons and tons of movement. Knees to ears and all.

What you call an “interesting theory” is precisely how Caramel was produced. Caramel is SIRED by a 1/2 Welsh 1/2 warmblood stallion that is licensed and approved with Weser-Ems. He has even more Warmblood in his dam line in the third generation from the again 1/2 Welsh 1/2 Warmblood, Black Boy. I don’t think you can lump the stallions you list in the same category. Nemax, Caramel, Dimension AT and Dreidimensional AT (1/2 brother to my stallion, Diamond King - same sire - Dance Star AT) were all developed from completely different routes. And even Dimension has Trakehner in his background.

I do have a pony mare from Mr Ellers that is a product of his breeding plan and she is lovely but my GRP breeder friends were still surprised I bought her…But that was a hard fought choice and I got a whopping big boatload of eye rolling from my very successful GRP breeder buddies!

So, my next question is if this is just an “interesting theory” that you aren’t too sure about, and there are plenty of GRP ponies that move extravagantly so that you don’t have to go the 1/2 & 1/2 route, and your GRP breeder buddies all roll their eyes at it, then explain to me why you bought a 1/2 Welsh 1/2 warmblood from the Ellers breeding program?

For the record, I also bought a 1/2 Welsh 1/2 Warmblood from the Ellers program (Charivari/Sandro Hit) she was the Champion of the Elite Foal Championships in Weser-Ems and I bought her at the Elite Foal Auction almost 10 years ago - and if I’d known then what I know now I would never have done it!! Why? Because I can make 1/2 Welsh 1/2 Warmblood all day long in the US - I should not have spent the money on something that I can do just as well in the US. I should have spent the money on the unique pony bloodlines that make the GRP special and make the GRP what it has become - bloodlines like FS Don’t Worry, FS Champion de Luxe, Dornik B, Golden Dancer, Brillant, etc… I’ve since corrected my first mistake.

My GRP breeder friends also roll their eyes at the 1/2 Welsh 1/2 Warmblood cross. When I ask why some Germans (Ellers) do it they just shrug their shoulders and say - it’s an end product. And like I said before my opinion lies somewhere in the middle of the two breeding approaches. I will say I don’t like it when a 1/2 Welsh 1/2 Warmblood is called a GRP, because in my opinion it is not a GRP but one small ingredient in the creation of a GRP.

By the way, I love your stallion Golden State and I plan to breed my mare Dew Drop to him. I think that combination is a very interesting line breeding of the super Golden Moonlight stallion. I’m also very excited about having Manchester City available as he is an important tool in the toolbox of GRP breeders being 1/2 Welsh 1/2 GRP - the GRP line (the dam line) of which by the way has one line of Hanoverian!

[honeylips]

First off - you are being argumentative and attacking - or at least that is the way your message is coming across was my take on it. Sorry if I made that mistake. MY message above was SUPPORTIVE in that I understand and have made similar purchases myself - but you did take my post apart and demand that I defend things I said in it and even put words in my post that I didn’t write.

As I stated for me it’s an “interesting theory” (and that is meant in a positive way not negative as you have assumed - I never said it was one I “wasn’t too sure about”) and therefore I too stuck my toe in the water a couple of years ago by buying a 1/4 Grp, 1/4 welsh, 1/2 WB top filly from Mr Ellers. Whom I will breed back to smaller GRPs so the offspring is only 1/4 WB and I will have to be extraordinarily careful in doing so. As well I also looked at the other 1/2 small GRP 1/2 wb colt the other year. So I am not immune to this concept and see the USA value in it, hence my activities the past 3 years already in this breeding concept. But all the rest of my ponies are very heavily based in the tried and true pony bloodlines.

And yes it is a breeding theory that I get a boatload of eyerolling from my German breeder partners but hey - I’ll take a gamble.

A point from above was that if you are purely searching for the extreme flashy movement of Totilas as your goal " I’d sure like to try to get that awesomeness in a small package!!!"- that movement is available in pony size if that is what you are really after. If you are after a Totilas foal - then just be upfront with that desire. It’s just not a desire that I share. I differ from you in that if there is a need/desire to infuse some WB in my breeding program Totilas is just not where I would be going. But that’s me. I would be looking more Rubinstein/Donnerhall/DeNiro/Damon Hill ish.

The interesting thing is that the example stallions I gave are of different origins and types and they all can produce the movement you say you are looking for - without the risk of going 1/2 WB so in case OTHERS are looking for the really mega movement but don’t want to go to full WB - I’m giving options that are out there for those who are less immersed in the pony scene than you and I.

For me though when going down this breeding mode - I am more of a fan of the concept when doing this cross of Small on Big rather than Big on Small. Like the provent german pattern when using TBs of putting the “blood on top”. So I chose to purchase “small on big” as that seems to be a safer and somewhat predictable outcome thus far.

But for me - the only difference in opinion we have, as I stated before, is I am just not a Totilas fan as a breeding stallion for the USA amateur market, based on himself and his offspring. But it’s just me and I am sure there are a ton of ammy buyers in the USA who will love to have the chance to buy a ‘small’ Totilas should you decide to sell your foals.

But as I said with MY mares and stallions I want as much movement as I can get but with a temperament that is suitable for children and lady riders (same as the GRP societies goals). I can’t reconcile Totilas with that goal. Especially since most of the USA buyers I get are smaller ladies looking to not be over horsed or intimidated by their mounts. So it may or may not be as flashy but overall, in MY breeding goals I will try to value high rideability and calm and steady temperament over hot and flashy and if I can breed the total package of both ridebility and flashy gaits - then that is a bonus. But that’s exactly why I haven’t bred to Dimension or Dreidimensional or bought foals from either one (even though I do state above that both puts a heck of a trot on the beautiful foals), perhaps it affects my choices since I am so familiar with both and have seen them in many circumstances and obviously work with Wibke. But they do put a mega flashy trot on the foals - that is true.

But that’s me and we can differ in opinion about Totilas without you attacking me.

FWIW - Golden State is not,however, line bred on Golden Moonlight. Sorry for misunderstanding your earlier post that your mare with Goldi would give line breeding.

I also don’t view this debate as “not getting along” but I do see you are very defensive about your choice of Totilas and don’t like the fact that other disagree with you choice of both him as a stallion and the big on small concept.

I for one, in terms of my breeding and purchases, overall am more of a traditionalist at this point. I see so many ponies already bred that are far too ‘hot’ for the average ammy USA rider looking to buy that I just don’t think Totilas is a good idea. But its your breeding program not mine.
In Germany the ponies already have enough “heat” into them - they certainly don’t need a hottie like Toto added to the mix and they already produce way enough size so that also limits the interest of my breeder friends to mix in WB at this point in the breeding continuum. I have to say at this point - I agree with them on all fronts.

[mbm]

interesting conversation!

and fwiw, i didn’t read Foxcreeks post as an attack - i do hope that you both will continue this super dialog as it is very educational.

FoxCreek - I bred my Wolkentanz I mare to Manchester City - that foal is (cross fingers and knock wood) due later this month. I am really looking forward to see what he produces

[foxcreek]

Yeah, that’s exactly what I was afraid of happening. You’ll notice it took me a whole day to post because I was worried about it. You did take my post in a way I did NOT intend. This is why I rarely post on here. And I think it’s sad that most of the people in the US who are truly knowledgeable about and interested in the GRP don’t seem to be able to get along.

If we had been at dinner together and discussing breeding GRP’s and this whole topic I would have asked you the EXACT same questions.

I did NOT say that Golden State was line bred Golden Moonlight.

I said the COMBINATION of Golden State to my mare Surrender Dew Drop would be a Golden Moonlight line breeding.

[JB]

FWIW, I did not read anything personal or attacking in EITHER of your posts here

I do think this whole thread would have gone a very different, more positive way, if the breedings had been, as honeylips said, small on large, even if it was a Totilas mare

honeylips - did I read you right that you were saying the small on large cross tends to provide more reliable results, and that those offspring tend to provide more reliability in terms of height?

[VirginiaBred]

@honeylips

For me though when going down this breeding mode - I am more of a fan of the concept when doing this cross of Small on Big rather than Big on Small. Like the proven German pattern when using TBs of putting the “blood on top”. So I chose to purchase “small on big” as that seems to be a safer and somewhat predictable outcome thus far.

^^^THIS^^^ In breeding situations this is the safer approach for the mare.

[goodpony]

I believe in traditional horse breeding thats called ‘blood over bone’.

Its an interesting concept as when I brought my mare up for her performance test it was suggested to me that i breed her to the “HOTTEST” stallion I could find. Her 2010 colt foal is just like her in temperament and is uber-rideable, easy minded–really the ideal sort of temperament in keeping with the pony breeding tradition.