RE: RE: Karahty (and Bloodlines in Arabs)

["Kathy Mayeda" <kathy_mayeda@atce.com>]

All this is very interesting statistically, but I think that there are many
modern stallions out there that might produce excellent endurance mounts but
never get into the endurance registries because their get are primarily used
for performance, pleasure, show, pasture ornaments, or breeding for
breeding's sake.   Since we are seeing a lot of successful endurance horses
being rescued from feedlots, who probably have a good lick of all these
stallions listed in their pedigree, what does it really mean to us?


-----Original Message-----
From:	CMKSAGEHIL@aol.com [mailto:CMKSAGEHIL@aol.com]
Sent:	Thursday, April 20, 2000 12:52 PM
To:	bobmorris@rmci.net; katswig@earthlink.net
Cc:	ridecamp@endurance.net
Subject:	RC:   RE: Karahty (and Bloodlines in Arabs)

In a message dated 4/20/00 9:32:18 AM Pacific Daylight Time,
bobmorris@rmci.net writes:

<< Realize we only went back five generations as anything further does
not
have
 immediate influence on performance. >>

That's only true when you are dealing with a diverse group of ancestors.
The
vast majority of the horses that came up repeatedly in your study are
actually quite closely related, which becomes obvious going back just a
few
more generations.  One stallion in particular (Mesaoud) often does not
appear
in modern pedigrees until one goes back 7 or 8 generations, but appears
literally hundreds of times, so actually makes up a very high percentage
of
the pedigree.  I was shocked when I counted the number of times he
appeared
in the pedigrees of my own stallions, and then calculated the actual
percentages of their pedigrees that he represents--it ranged from a low
of
12.4% to a high of 19.8%.  Furthermore (reference geneticists Michael
and Ann
Bowling for explanation if you don't grasp this), an individual has far
more
influence on a pedigree by appearing multiple times several generations
back
than he or she does by appearing fewer times up close (if he is
represented
by different ones of his offspring) because each different offspring has
a
different subset of the genes of that particular ancestor.  Mesaoud, for

instance, appears in pedigrees in my own herd through over 20 of his
offspring--each of which represents a "unique" half of his genetic
material.
(And my group is fairly representative of the Mesaoud influence in North

America, I might add.)  To look at a more recent example of representing
a
particular ancestor--we've tried to represent Abu Farwa (among several
other
ancestors) in our program, and although since he is more modern than
Mesaoud,
it is difficult to find such a spread in one pedigree, he occurs through
24
different offspring in our program.  In another 3 or 4 generations, he
could
well appear much the way that Mesaoud does in the current pedigrees.
Does
that mean he would no longer be an influence?  Hardly!

The current study under discussion is interesting, but as Kris pointed
out
(and Salim concurred) it does not ask specific questions.  And as others
have
pointed out, it does not delineate possible differences between
successful
endurance horses and the North American gene pool at large.  Michael
Bowling
has done a random sample of relatively current stud books which he has
used
for several studies--it would be interesting to look at this list in
context
of that random sample, for instance.

Heidi


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