Oh my...has it been a week already? *sigh* Time does fly! Thank you, everyone who wrote and encouraged me, and yes, Katie, we need to get in contact again! I miss you =)
It seems hard to get used to thinking of spring in January, but I can't quit doing so this year. I am anxious to mess with my little horses, to watch tiny foals playing, even almost for the sleepless nights in a barn waiting....it being in the 70's this week doesn't help LOL! I'm not complaining, though, no, not at all! I loved the snow up north when younger, but that cold cuts right through me anymore it seems.
I am thinking alot about breeding, these days. Sitting in bed has allowed me too much time for web surfing, looking at other farms, but again, I'm not complaining *laughs* Studying the various horses' bodies, and the bloodlines behind them, when they are given.
I think it deeply sad, personally, that so little concern as to blood seems to exist in our breed.
Oh, there are those to whom it matters, and for them, I am also deeply grateful. There are those to whom it appears to be only a marketing tool, and those who still cling stubbornly to 'it doesn't matter'. That line of thought befuddles me. Do people not understand we are, all of us in creation, a product of our bloodlines? Of course what is behind a horse is going to affect it! It can not NOT affect it....it is in the very fundamentals of creations' orders...each reproduces after it's kind. Yes, horse creates horse and human creates human and dog creates dog...but again, that is the order at ITS very fundamental. But the order stands. A horse with cowhocks is going to produce a horse with cowhocks. A horse with a weak hip is going to produce a horse with a weak hip. It cannot do otherwise. It must obey the laws of creation.
Yes, we as humans can manipulate, and do, with some measure of success. That said, when one researches the history of horse breeding among it's various breeds, one finds that breeds are developed, types are set, by breeding for those types. Some European breeds even exclude from the right to breed animals that do not pass their examinations to prove the animals does possess the desired traits!
Now, our breed as a whole has a large range of types, and that is part of the charm of the breed. Almost anyone coming from a large horse background can find a mini to suit them and their preferred characteristics. This, for our beautiful Miniatures, is a wonderful thing. There is nothing wrong, imo, (remembering, too, that blogs are just that, one persons opinions on things), for this to be. But I would like today to thank those breeders whose websites I have visited these past weeks with a PURPOSE to their breeding. It is these breeders who will keep our beloved minis from becoming just another pet, just another designer breed horse equivalent. To find farms who want to produce open pleasure driving horses, for instance, and to visit their stallion and mare pages and SEE horses being used for breeding who actually can produce-because they have it themselves-is a treat.
I am still lamenting the point of view also, that I found more than I had hoped, that a very good stallion can breed just any mare and produce exceptional foals. No, no one was advertising 'Hey, I just use any mare I can find!' but...*shakes head* one needs to know what one is doing to do it right. The stallion is only half the equation. If he has a very good hip and your mares' hip is short and weak and her croup drops off like a ski slope, you are not going to get great hipped horses--and even the occasional one you do get, will carry those awful genes as recessives! And that is where blood comes in....if we continue to disregard it, oh it doesn't matter, it's a young breed, etc....we will continue to have crop outs of poor quality way too consistently. What is behind your horse matters. Phenotype traits often skip a generation, so what is behind your horse REALLY matters! And I have to go pick my son up, so I'll leave that for now...
