I grew up believing that it was almost impossible for twin foals to survive. But recent events have got me thinking that maybe the odds are now better than we thought they were.
Category: Breeding
We’ve all heard the stories of crazy chestnut mares and been warned off buying one. The amount of tongue and cheek sayings we have about them demonstrates this fantastically! But is it possible for behaviour to be linked to coat colour? And is there any evidence to back up the…
For some horse owners, the idea of owning a stallion is exciting and a bit of a dream. After all, we can all imagine how striking a gorgeous stallion strolling into the ring is. However, unless the horse has fantastic breeding value and you intend to breed from him, you…
There are two sisters at my yard who have been breeding and producing their own horses for years for eventing and showing. One of them is an equine vet and has worked on some very popular stallions over the years, so they have a very interesting ideas on stallion and…
A few weeks ago (7th Jan) BBC’s Countryfile looked at what is being done to preserve rare native breeds in the UK, looking specifically at our native horses. I finally got round to watching it and thought it touched upon some really interesting ideas, albeit fairly briefly. The program followed…
It has been a pretty exciting week here at EquiPepper with the announcement that we will be attending Olympia ‘Race Night’ as press! I can’t wait for this and have so many exciting ideas to bring you all the best from our time there, in the meantime keep your eyes…
Yesterday we had our first Equestrian Gold medal of the Rio Olympics! Charlotte Dujardin did a fantastic job of defending her Individual Dressage Gold Medal with superstar Valegro. They rode a truly beautiful test and scored a fantastic 93.857%, only about 1% off the world record for free style (which…
It has recently been announced that top dressage stallion, Totilas’s stud fee will be reduced by £4128! This is a huge price drop and makes you question why? One of Totilas’s sons won the KWPN stallion competition. With such impressive stallions with the Totilas blood line, it is possible that…
If you work, or know people working in the thoroughbred breeding industry, this post is aimed specifically at you! This is a bit of a reach, as these photos may not exist, but I am trying to get hold of some photos of Scottie as a foal. Scottie was born…
It is widely accepted that thoroughbreds have been selectively bred for speed over the decades. However, there is a lot of debate as to whether thoroughbreds are getting faster or not. One study found that over the past 100 years, winning times in top races have not changed, suggesting that…
This post is about a little Welsh Section A mare called Peggy. Peggy and Ginny were my first experiences of non-riding school ponies. I must have been 12/13 at the time and was really excited and probably a bit too confident for my own good. Peggy was only a baby…
For those of you who follow horse racing, you might have heard about the ‘speed’ gene. Despite how it is often described, speed and racing performance is not dictated by this one gene, it is influenced by lots of genes and by environmental factors, especially training. However, this speed gene…
One of my assignments this semester is to put together a breed improvement scheme for a specific breed or type. I think this is going to be quite a fun assignment, although quite hard when it comes to talking about all the heritability bits and finding journal papers for references……
I really love genetics, especially when it comes to something complicated like coat colour, which is influenced by several genes. After a few lectures on coat genetics at University I just had to write this post sharing what I had discovered ad a lot of it is quite surprising. Did…
My degree at University is focused on breeding and stud management. During my first two years there I have had it drilled into me the importance of a good breeding aim. This is vital as there are already loads of mediocre horses in the UK, many of which are ending…
