To breed or not to breed?

[Witchhunted]

This is taking way too much of my mindspace at the moment and would appreciate some opinions.

I have an absolutely gorgeous, very well bred and rare breed mare who is my world. She's from a bloodline that is ending now, and she's getting on a bit (17) and I keep thinking how I will be devestated when I lose her.

So I'm toying with the idea of breeding her. Spoke to mare's breeder who thinks it's a great idea and recommended some stallions. I'm on a yard that regularly breeds foals so plenty of experienced folks about.

But - I'm terrified of anything happening to my mare, especially being an older maiden.

I've thought about just buying instead but like I say, I'm doing it to keep a piece of her - not just for a foal in general. I also thought about a surrogate but think it might be insanely expensive.

WWYD, would you risk it? The foal would only ever be for me, not for resell and if for any reason it turned out wrong size or imperfect it would be kept forever as a non ridden pet.

Is it worth talking it through with your vet to understand the risks to her health and the likelihood of a positive outcome?

As a non-expert I wouldn’t risk it, since she means so much to you. If the bloodline is ending, are there still some relatives, since the breeder has mentioned stallions?

You will always have your memories of her - and there’s no guarantee that a foal would be anything like her.

Agree, worth a discussion with a repro specialist vet to properly understand the costs and risks. Family members used to breed on a small scale and my take is that like all things with horses it's joyful and wonderful to have a homebred when things go well and expensive and heartbreaking when they don't. I'm sure you're aware there's a very much non-zero risk of losing the mare or the foal or both at some stage of the pregnancy or birth, as well of course as the lesser but still bad risks of her not taking at all, or slipping the pregnancy, or the foal coming out with lifelong problems or killing or permanently injuring itself as a youngster or just not being what you'd want... Yours is about the only scenario (rare bloodline, mare is good quality and you want a foal for yourself to keep) where it makes sense to do it TBH, in nearly every other occasion it makes so much more sense to buy a youngster or made horse rather than breed your own. Sorry that's a bit doom and gloom but you need to have your eyes open.

Ask what the vet thinks, but I'd see how much more a surrogate would actually cost. You're right, it will definitely be £££, but frankly if you do it at all you need to be prepared for it to be staggeringly expensive throughout. Given your mare's age and the fact she's precious you are probably looking on the more expensive side anyway, likely stays at the clinic and AI to get in foal, then foaling out at the vets too or at least an experienced stud rather than the old fashioned approach of chuck her in a field with the stallion in heat and hope she takes and doesn't kick the stallion to death, as my family used to do with their hill Welshies - nearly all breeders these days seem to prefer collection and AI over live cover anyway, aside from racing TBs of course, much easier and safer for the stallion and safer for the mare too albeit more expensive/more difficult. So you'd have all those costs anyway, the embryo flush and hire of the recip on top might not be that much more and so much safer for your mare - friends on the yard had a homebred foal from a much loved older mare and used a recip, I didn't ask how much it cost but they're wealthy without being billionaires so can't be stratospherically expensive?

My friend bred a foal for exactly the same reasons. The older mare had a horrible birth, my friend was worried she was going to die, and it was only through the quick intervention of an on-site more experienced person that she didn’t. The foal grew into a rather unpleasant individual - it ‘played’ with a young person (exact details not given so as not to out anyone involved, but should be noted neither the owner or the young person was at fault) that ended up in a legal case for compensation for a substantial injury to the young person. The by-then grown up foal was too scary for her to ride, and she ended up giving it away to a trusted third party who still has it. As far as I can tell, it is still a problematic horse.

Otoh, another friend has bred 2 foals for the same reason, both problem free, both sweet young horses. She had not intended to sell either, but the cost of keeping both mares and 2 foals has been much greater than she anticipated, and she cannot afford all of them. One mare is old now and holds a place in her heart, the other is injured, so the foals will be sold. One of the foals is nearly the ‘piece of its mother’ she was hoping for. It is the wrong colour and the wrong sex (compared with if she were buying a horse) but is the right size and temperament. The other is a lovely horse, but is also the wrong sex, wrong colour, and has grown far too big. This friend is a fabulous horsewoman, but fails to see that her horses are so lovely because she has a good eye, buys a nice natured one, and then handles them extremely well. By default, any horse she could buy would be just as nice, and she doesn’t see much of the mothers in the foals she has bred. But now she currently has nothing to ride, (one too old, one injured, two too young) despite paying for the upkeep of 4 horses, and this is leading to depression for her.

The question about whether to breed or not for personal and sentimental reasons raises a lot of questions.

• do you have the time, money, resources and knowledge to keep 2 horses (mother and foal) for years, giving them both the healthcare, education, stimulation and exercise they need? You talk about a non ridden pet, but you will effectively have 2 non ridden pets if you have the mare as well. Keeping expensive pets is a completely different hobby to riding!
• are you prepared for your mare, or the foal, to die during the process? Every year my Facebook is filled with devastated owners looking for a foster mare/foal who had no idea breeding was such a risky business.
• do you want a piece of your old mare? What will you think of the horse if it is nothing at all like your old mare? What if it turns out to be as far from your old mare as you could imagine and you actually don’t like it? You can choose your friends, but not your family and all that. Both friends mentioned above felt a huge amount of disloyalty to their mares for wanting to ‘get rid’ of the youngster. One so much so she gave the horse away, and accepted the loss of all the financial input as collateral damage.
• if you want another horse once your mare is old, are you prepared to wait out the time when you are paying for multiple horses but not able to ride?
• is your mare suitable for breeding from? Really? What makes you absolutely sure? Is she honestly so sweet natured, so conformationally perfect, that she will produce a good foal? And do you know enough about the stallion, who will pass on all of his traits too? I understand about wanting a piece of your mare. My children’s pony was a breeding stallion before we bought him, and I actually bought one of his offspring as I liked him so much. But he was already mature and being ridden - I could see what I was getting.

All of the above is just scratching the surface. Every day I see horses that I think ‘who the heck bred that?’ There are a lot of lovely horses out there, and there are a lot of not lovely ones. I am not saying any of the above to put you off doing it, but to ask you to really think about what you want and whether you have the resources to do it. It can be a wonderful thing, but that assumes all goes well. I’ll leave you with another example - a third friend who I saw at the weekend did exactly the same as the other 2 friends above, and what you want to do. Her mare is extremely rare, having been imported many years ago from a very long way away. She is one of very few in this country, from a breed which is rare in the world. She bred a foal from her, she was an older mare. And last weekend she rode the foal in his first competition, the thing she has been building up to for the last 6 years, and won. Everyone (me included) was delighted for her, because this has been a long and hard journey for her, and she now feels like her journey is finally getting to the good bit. But it’s been long to get here!

I wouldn’t have a foal using a 17 year old maiden mare. I wouldn’t even look into any further in your shoes, unless you were willing to go down the surrogate route.

I bred my own horse, he is 4, just being backed now and the love of my life.
It was eye-wateringly expensive. I had a 2k vet bill for foaling as she foaled at the vets due to baby being positioned wrong the day before, didn’t need any intervention but still came to 2k!

I wouldn’t want to breed a 17 year old maiden so if you really want to do it, I would look at surrogates. Frankly, it will be incredibly expensive either way!

I would also consider the mare’s temperament, confirmation and ability. The rare breed/bloodline seems a reasonable reason to breed but not enough if the mare isn’t an excellent example of her breed.

The mare I bred is the only one I’ve had that I felt was good enough. She had an excellent temperament, scope to burn but easy enough for an amateur to produce and an excellent competition record. I chose to a stallion to strengthen her confirmation weaknesses and I’m very happy with what came out.

It’s just worth bearing in mind, you may have every intention of keeping the foal for life (I certainly do!) but you never know when life may drastically change and you’re forced to part. I consider it my job to ensure I bred a useful horse and I will produce him to the best of my ability so if the worst should happen, he will easily find a good home. Though I’d sell everything I own including the wife first!

God, no! The fact that you are even asking is an excellent indicator that you shouldn't.

Horse breeding is awful at the moment. The massive number of home breds that inexperienced people had to breed because of how special their mare was is but one problem.

You don't sound at all ready to do this and the fact that other people on your yard might be willing to help, doesn't really give you the safety net a newbie would need.

Also, echo what has been said about a maiden 17yo. It's really not fair.