This message is from: "Anneli Sundkvist" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Anna wrote: >>I have spent my life studying many different breeds and I think quite a few are great breeds, but many are too specialized and should not be owned by the average owner, but to combine that those breeds with something like a Fjord for temperment and bone would make a phenomenal horse.>> As you say quite a few breeds ARE suitable for the average horseowner, so why try to change the more specialized breeds by crossing them with Fjords when there are enough horse breeds already to fit the needs of 99% of us horse owners? I have seen several fjordcrosses (FjordXSwedish warmblod, Gotland pony, TB, Belgian, Lipizzaner, Shetland...) and none of them have been better than any of the two original breeds used for the cross, just different. Once when I was thinking of which stallion to breed my mare to, one of my friends suggested me to use a stallion from a different breed since that would give me a larger horse (I had thoughts about buying a larger horse at the time). I just thought that if I wanted a horse similar to Fjord/TB or Fjord/warmblood cross, I could might as well buy a North-Swedish trotter or Döle trotter. Apart from seldom having the dun colour, these breeds look pretty much (when it comes to type - they have their own breed-characteristics) like the Fjord/TB:s or Fjord/WB:s I've seen and there are horses out there that NEED HOMES since they haven't done well enough in the harness racing to be used in the breeding programmes. If I wanted a larger horse, why should I cross breed from my! mare instead of given one of these ex harness-racers a home? Many of them make wonderful pleasure horses. I don't know about the situation in the rest of the world, but here in Sweden we're about to face problems with a lot of unwanted horses very soon. It has become popular to breed for colour. Nothing wrong in that, but right now it means that many people breed their standardbred mares (re-schooled as riding horses) with paint- or pinto stallions. There are a lot of advertisments where these crosses (most of them "un-coloured", the "coloured" are more expensive) are offered at very low prices. Some of them end up with the Swedish rescue organisation. The fathers might be top-quality stallions, but many of the foals are still unwanted horses that have been produced because the mare-owners felt that they wanted to breed from their mare. My point is that event though these foals have a 'trendy' father, most people just tend to see their 'not-so-trendy' mother and the foal might become another unwanted horse! Just my 2 cents! Regards Anneli
