Endurance.Net Ridecamp Archives

Poppycock, Heidi. Magness was doing no more than what other top race 
breeders commonly do (in the t-breds as well). Just because a horse 
isn't in the "top 20" (which Seabiscuit never was nor Phar Lap, BTW) 
doesn't mean they are lacking quality or that the farm's breeding 
program wasn't a success. Making some of the top money in the race 
industry probably denoted success to the Magnesses. They just had to 
make choices as to which offspring to put LOTS of money into-- race 
training is costly.
I'll work with Lif and whoever else wants to give input and we will put 
together something for AHA and those who want to try yet again to make a 
difference (the civil rights bill wasn't passed the first go-round 
either) can participate and others can proceed however they feel best 
(even if it is to do nothing). This thread was a wake-up call for me 
that I haven't tried anything lately with AHA about the decline of the 
industry except gripe about it to others who felt the same way. Now with 
Registrations down, it may be a good time. I don't think we have any 
major disagreements, Heidi. My complaints are just not as generalized as 
yours and I choose to do something now with AHA now that it has merged 
with IAHA. I never said efforts haven't and couldn't be made in other 
areas-- Truman's idea of suggesting that AHA attend ride conferences is 
excellent and should be put into this letter to AHA.. I've spent a lot 
of money with them with registrations, shipped semen permits, blood 
kits... Sweepstakes Nominations...DNA tests... whatever--- as I'm sure 
you have...seems like they always have their hand out for one more 
expense--- hopefully if enough join together it can make a difference. 
There is a competing Registry, BTW in case you don't know; it was 
developed by Jay Stream. It is not important for endurance riders to be 
registered with the AHA in order to participate and they can always show 
a pedigree from the other Registry, which to my knowledge is the only 
Registry accepted by WAHO (unless some recent development just happened 
that I am unaware of-- being out of racing it is easy to lose track of 
all the politics).
You make your impact by breeding and I'll make mine in the best way I 
feel able to and perhaps between us and a whole lot of others such as 
Lif, Jan, Truman, and lots of others, we can turn this thing around. 
Let's not snipe at each other. I never criticized your contribution of 
breeding, just pointed out that perhaps that was not the best way to 
proceed in my neck of the woods.
If I don't respond to your next rebuttal post, it is only because I 
believe we've beaten this dead horse to death :-) and does not imply 
agreement, disagreement...whatever
Have a nice weekend
Bette

heidi@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:

> > > Heidi
> > > "I agree that there has been overbreeding of mediocre horses.  >But
> > > there is still a relative shortage of good ones."
> > >      
> > Magness Arabians was breeding between 250 and 500/year--- hardly what I
> > would call mediocre. They would pick out 20 for their first string race
> > prospects and then another 20-40 backup and then give-away or sell for
> > peanuts the rest. They were just one of the race breeding farms in CA.
> >    
>
> Bette, that IS mediocrity!  If it takes that many foals to get enough to
> have that size a racing string, we are talking about breeding a lot of
> JUNK in the remainder.  WHAT YOU DESCRIBE HERE IS PRECISELY THE PROBLEM! 
> People will buy the dross because it is "related to" the successful race
> stuff--but what they have is still a cull!  If only 10% of my foals were
> of useful caliber and I had to "sell the rest for peanuts" I'd have to
> assume I was doing something terribly wrong.
>
>  
>
> > The problem in CA (I'm not talking about other states here) is not
> > mediocrity so much as overproduction. I've looked at MAgness' "discards"
> > and they were very nicely balanced, good conformation and good
> > attitudes.
> >    
>
> Can't speak for Magness in particular, but I see a whole LOT of these same
> sorts of horses out on the trail--they don't look all that bad, certainly
> not the sausage show horses, but they are NOT top-drawer athletes.  And
> any program that has to ditch that many in order to produce a few good
> ones is the VERY thing that is driving our breed into the gutter.
>
> And if all these "overproduced" horses in CA are of such good quality, why
> is it that we see buyers from CA going elsewhere for their horses??  I
> know there are good horses in CA--but time and time again we get folks
> inquiring here because they can't find horses that meet their standards. 
> Barbara went to Montana for her gelding, and I know she's been looking for
> a couple of years.  While the horses you talk about may not be "bad"
> horses they are nonetheless not necessarily what the riding public is
> looking for.  And therein lies a lot of the problem!
>
>  
>
> > We are in a unique position perhaps in CA as the race
> > industry for Arabians centers here, Texas, FL and Delaware. They breed
> > numbers to beat the odds.
> >    
>
> Translated, that means they don't have a well-enough designed program to
> produce the qualities they want with any sort of consistency.  I would
> also submit that specialization for racing does not particularly produce
> good riding horses--otherwise, the world would be beating a path to the
> barns of the TB breeders for their rejects.
>
>  
>
> > The problem was that many of these horses
> > wound up at killers-- not enough buyers and they were not promoted as
> > trail or show horses nor trained-- simple gotten rid of ASAP for
> > pennies.
> >    
>
> Again, had they been successful on the trails in any great numbers, people
> would have been beating paths to their doors.  That has not been the case.
>
>  
>
> > Many of the other breeders gave up as we could not compete with
> > these big farms. IT was responsible of us to lay low
> >    
>
> If you are producing the same thing they are--then yes, it is the
> responsible thing to do.  Most of the breeders in my acquaintence are NOT
> breeding what they do, and do not have the same problems with marketing
> "culls."
>
>  
>
> > what with ARabian
> > registrations down and horse production skyrocketing.
> >    
>
> Kind of a contradiction.  Or are you saying that these farms are dumping
> their culls unregistered?  Well, if so, double shame on them, not only for
> breeding something with no future, but for robbing it of whatever heritage
> it has.  Meanwhile, if registrations are down, that means that there are
> fewer registered Arabians being produced.  The quality ones still find a
> niche.
>
>  
>
> > Fortunately (in
> > one ironic sense) with the introduction of the French so-called
> > "purebreds" entering the racing field and blowing away the competition,
> > racing revenues went down, purebred breeders went out of the business or
> > cut way back, and now things are much better in CA. In fact the Riding
> > MAg wrote that there was a shortage of show horses due to breedings
> > being down. Too bad so many of those athletes went for cat food at the
> > zoo. Yet, the pendulum swings for a reason.
> >    
>
> The overproduction of racing specialists may be seeing a lot of those
> going for cat food.  But it has become increasingly rare to find old-style
> classical traditional Arabian RIDING horses in that sort of plight.  And
> when one does, there is usually a story behind it, such as a bitter
> ex-spouse trying to "get" theirs, or some such--not a matter of a breeder
> dumping excess horses.
>
> While I don't deny that race horses are athletes, I would submit that we
> are talking about two different groups of horses here.
>
> Heidi
>
>
>
>
>  

--
Bette Lamore
Whispering Oaks Arabians
Home of Bunny and 16.2h TLA Halynov
who lives on through his legacy Hal's Riverdance!
http://www.arabiansporthorse.com

Always remember: "Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away." (George Carlin)



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Every horse can be taught to walk faster than you think.  It is one of the
most important qualities of a good riding horse.  Some have it naturally,
others need to learn. On the other hand, if you are riding a tired horse,
an easy jog is more efficient, covers more groumnd with less effort.  (it's
the rebound effect of the two beat trot)
~  Dot Wiggins

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