This message is from: "bushnell" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >... -- Don't you agree that as Bob van Bon once said - "The most important thing you can do for the breed in America is to > inspect the foals" --.....>> Carol
BOB van BON is renowned, his Fjord prowess of legendary proportion, as you have well portrayed him in the past ...but are you absolutely certain that's what he said? (or how he said it) Because it seems to me it would have been MORE important to inspect the parent machinery, before you got down to product quality? It's been our experience that marked changes occur in development between foalhood and three years of age. Sometimes, what might be interpreted as a minor flaw at birth, has a way of correcting itself with time. I have never known of a Fjord foal to have a problem with teeth and/or testicles but I would imagine that they, like other breeds and humans, have development that is individualized and therefore not subject to timed requirement. Didn't someone just technically verify that an improper bite can aright itself with development? As far as testicles go, which is a major subject in dogdom, it has not been scientifically verified that cryptorchism is hereditary, or that breeding one would be detrimental. Although most breeds forbid it, there is no substantiation for disallowing it. But I digress. I've been following the DVD chain of thought and it sounds like there's a lot of interest out there, but I don't agree on foal evaluating at all. I think our vets would rebel if we drug them out here to participate in a DVD, while they have more pressing matters to attend to (worse, they might even laugh at us). Using my imagination here.. a foal might have a difficult delivery and be somewhat compressed or traumatized, but given time, everything would mend itself. Not every living thing enfolds in the same precise pattern, just as your roses are all unique. If the time ever comes when Fjords are all "cooky cutter" foals... we are in "deep doo-doo," because it will mean that the breed has reached the horrific state of homozygosis. So let's always be trying to rectify the culling mentality. That foal that is slow to drop its testicles, or whose bite might be somewhat occluded, might be a vital piece of genetic material; the very contingency for future breed vigor. Of course I realize we are just brainstorming here.. in the doldrums of a late winter, but isn't this our best (and only) opportunity! maybe someone is taking notes, on what may turn out to be a wonderful turn of events for the Fjord. It seems that the DVD idea would be a most effective teaching tool for every Fjord owner. On a different subject... I missed last week...regards "reasons for gelding a stallion"-- I submit the best reason of all: when a stallion has maxed out their reasonable breeding quota. (in the interest of breed genetic health.) Ruthie, nw mt us
