Breeding

[stratton]

Just wanting some thought on the topic of breeding

1) When does linebreeding become inbreeding,IYO

2) How many times is to many for one ancestor to appear in a pedigree

3) Do you practice close breeding. If so what is your theories, sucess stories and or pitfalls you have come across.


Stratton

[cristy]

I try to keep it as far apart as I can. I do not breed my Capuchino granddaughters to my Capuchino son (not their father, they are from a different Capuchino son) I know many people who do breed much closer, I don't think there is anything really wrong with it, I just go with better safe than sorry, If I think it would be gross in humans I don't to it. (I know that is silly)

I heard of a guy who is breeding Turabo (PPR) 1/2 brother to sister and getting some really Awesome stuff. I say to each his own. (I was very curious about this too.)

[Carol Nelson]

Well...I have bred my Cappy daughter to my Cappy grandson. Um...my filly seems ok...she's a yearling...kinda homely, though. Actually I feel she's my homeliest horse... :roll: ;-)
People who come to my farm seem to like her but hey, you gotta be able to critique your own horses, right??? ...and she's homely... :roll:
Although every month she gets a little prettier...and man, oh, man can she gait...!!! :shock:
She may turn out to be my ugly duckling turned swan...I don't know. Her mama sure is pretty and she's taking after her. Got her daddy's butt though. :D

[Candice Burger]

Just wanting some thought on the topic of breeding

1) When does linebreeding become inbreeding,IYO

Linebreeding is inbreeding. The nuances as to how far away in generation the repeated individual appears. Most follow the TB way of definition and there's at least two maybe more ways to define linebreeding. One definition says if the repeated horse doesn't show up until the 4th generation it's linebred. Another says if the repeated horse isn't until the 3rd generation it's linebred.

What that means is any breeding to grandparents, uncles, aunts, first cousins, mother, father, daughter, son is considered inbred and not linebred.

All definitions are arbitrary, so really a person can make up their own mind about it. However, every single genetics book and book about breeding recognizes that linebreeding IS inbreeding because an individual horse is repeatedly "bred in".

You'll see some other definitions using inbreeding coefficient numbers and some ads saying "linebred with low inbreeding coefficients" and you'll be thinking "what the ----?" Well, don't worry about it. Look at the pedigree--preferably around 6-7 generations and it will tell the story.

2) How many times is to many for one ancestor to appear in a pedigree

Up to you to decide that. There are some horses I don't like to see allot of and some that don't bother me. My tastes, observations on production, dictate my tolerances.

One thing I personally do not like at all is using the same individual to inbreed back to a particular horse. For instance if a person just loves Resorte III and uses only Resorte IV to get this inbreeding factor higher, that's not always a good thing, because eventually the genetic weaknesses of Resort IV will appear negating the strengths of why the horse was bred to capture Resorte III.

For instance I like Bochica, like to have more of it, prefer it "linebred" but have only one main source and another minor one. For me, I'm searching for different sources of Bochica besides the one. The problem is many times the reason the one line is predominant is because it is also the most productive (as in numbers).

Anyway there's allot to consider and worth several topics under Fuera de Concuso forum.

3) Do you practice close breeding. If so what is your theories, sucess stories and or pitfalls you have come across.

Yes,
Succes is an immediate concentration of good, strong, prepotent traits that have the ability to influence the next generation.

Pitfalls, is the same concentration of weak traits or expression.

A TB breeding theorist, Clive Harper, expressed it the best. The TB history is chock full of highly inbred individuals of close breeding. The current practice is to linebred with some individuals showing up on the 3rd/4th generation and as far back as the 7th/9th. There's various arguments for both practices. Maybe another topic to start later.

Anyway, his comment about the inbred individuals was that when the concentration of these genetics occur this quickly, they usually are not great performers and sometimes the advantages of the concentration for production is not seen until several generations later. He reasoned that strength of inbred individuals was the ability to contribute the genes through a generation or two until they combined or recombined with other individuals with complimentary genes.

The assumptions for this idea are:
1. The inbreeding produced homozygosity for a particular gene. So, it's guaranteed to be inherited by the next generation and highly probable to be inherited by yet a second generation removed from the inbred individual.
2. The inbreeding produced more probable number of genes accumulated of the targeted individual. So while it may not cause homozygosity, what it did is there are more genes on several chromosomes. It's a numbers thing. So, it's more likely some of these genes will be passed on to the next generation no matter what and then on to another generation. Less in number but still enough to be influential.

His reasoning, so far, is the only one that makes sense and the only argument that I can find to support inbreeding. It goes along the lines of creating "pure" individuals to then outcross for "hybrid vigor".

Inbreeding, linebreeding, outcrossing all have merits and pitfalls. What I've found studying all of this is the most successful breeders in history are:
1. First and foremost true horsemen. They know horses.
2. Are very keen observers and well read; they keep up with current theories. They take notes, compare ideas, and blantantly copy successes and will duplicate that in their breeding shed.
3. They are not scared of taking risks but do so armed with knowledge.
4. They are not afraid to call a bad horse they bred a bad horse. They learn from their failures.
5. They know their horses, their bloodlines, their production, their quality, their ability.
6. They are focused and don't try to change their program based on trend or popularity. They know it takes time to develop a succssful program.

Many were also very superstitious no matter how stupid it appeared. I've read all types of superstitions that make absolutely no sense, but can't deny the breeder was very successful with his program.

Every historically successful breeder dabbled in all the breeding theories of their day. Each had an affinity for particular individuals, breeding patterns, and breeding practices. It's obvious this was based on their own intimate knowledge of their horses in their breeding shed and NOT on a particular trendy bloodline or practice. They stole breeding practices from each other based on what was in their breeding shed and NOT because it was "thing to do". They discovered what worked for them and their horses.

[motorgypsy]

Really interesting responses

brother sister = inbreeding
daughter grandfather = linebreeding

some lines you don't want want to close breed at all. Others you can't get enough of. It totally depends. You have to make the decision based on the individuals and what you know about the ancestors of those individuals.

We have brother to sister out of grandaughter to grandfather. You aren't going to get much closer than that and she's fabulous but we bought her, didn't breed her. We may well breed half brother to half sister or daughter to father though. We will not breed our colt to his mom though because she has long pasterns and flexy suspensories and we don't want to double up on that characteristic even though his aren't overly flexy. So it depends on what you have and what you want. You sure don't ever want to double on a line with major flaws of any kind whether it be brains, disposition, conformation, gait or even health.

[Terry Wallace]

Candice...do you still have that website address for the "inbreeding vs. linebreeding"... remember that site you found maybe a year ago....it was full of breeding info....
I lost the address.....

For my 2 cents.... we had done some inbreeding/linebreeding.
A father to daughter breeding...it yielded a parrot mouthed colt. It is something I would not do again. You are just as apt to get bad things as good things.

The King Ranch did a lot of it in the QH biz.... usually...you got to see the successes, and not the "failures"...

I guess if you have a bunch of horses to "experiment with" that would be one thing. For a small breeder like me...even one cull colt is not a good thing...so be very careful as you may get something you did not expect, that you won't be able to sell...... (nobody will buy)... we did geld and sell that parrot mouthed colt, and I considered it a "lesson learned" for me....

[Candice Burger]

I've got it somewhere Terry.

My collection of links is rather eclectic. I've got them stashed all over the place and not on a particular computer or place.

I'll see if I can hunt it up and post it here.