HGG Community Forums

When breeding by hand, even with even breeding, you will get a fairly large number of neutered foals. I think this is by design, because neutered show horses become the financial support for your stable. It also is a help because it lets you know which horses will probably never be the parents of better foals.

Leaving a selected group of mares with the same Paper level in a pasture for the full 30 days and adding a stallion with the equivalent paper level will increase the likelihood of more foals passing Breeding Advice or Strict Breeding Advice. However, there will still be some neuters in the bunch, and my experience, especially with colts, is that even then there are a significant number that I will neuter myself because they comparison test only about as good as their sires or even worse than brothers with the same paper level they have.

There are two things to look at when breeding "even." One is to breed horses of the same generation, as you mentioned. The other is to breed horses with the same paper level.

The PT test is divided into tenths of a point from 0 or below through about 15. That's a fairly fine sieve to separate horses by showing ability. Papering, on the other hand has basically 5 divisions that all horses can fall into--Showable Only/Failed, C/Yellow, B/Red, A/Blue, *Star/*Gold. As you can see, each level must contain a wider range of abilities than any division of the PT score. So it pays to check not only the generation number but also the paper level. It won't do much good to breed 2 second generation horses if the stallion is papered B and the mare is a second generation Yellow, and so forth.

Let me emphasize once again, neutered horses are not a bad thing. It's often said that the ideal goal is to have at least 3 neutered horses for every 1 intact horse. I've even seen Ammit recommend that a better ratio is 10 neuters to every intact. Regularly trained and shown neuters make money for your stable through the showing bonus. Intact horses, if you are regularly breeding them, are costing you money, especially if they live in your pasture(s). If they are in barns, it's wise to also train and show them regularly, but neuters get a training advantage, which is also why they are an important part of your stable.