Originally Posted 03/24/2013
Our impending foal for 2013 is sired by Ridley (Rotspon x Walt Disney I) out of MKK Worth the Wait. The goal of this match is to replicate strengths and improve on our mare, aka Tessa. As you can see from our evaluation of her conformation (below) she has many good things as well as a few 'weaknesses' as it relates to the sport of dressage.
First and foremost, her attitude and work ethic are phenomenal. Though you can not represent this in photos, it is most important to note how willing and forward she is in her attitude about her work. I believe many horses can compensate for conformational flaws with the right attitude and heart...and she has it!
Her overall balance is level to slightly downhill, though she does have a tendency to step deeply beneath her center of gravity. She articulates her joints in her gaits and has some loft to her movement. You might note how strong her loin connection is; this is a large enabler for her and one of her strong points. In addition, her center of gravity, represented by the blue line coming from where the red line following her shoulder angle and hip angle meet, is nearly where the rider sits. Another good point.
One of her weaker points is her neck. That is to say, the length, throat latch clearance and depth coming out of her chest. We'd like to see her neck lengthened, throat latch cleaned up a bit and the neck come out higher from the chest, thereby allow her balance to naturally shift further back onto her haunches.
She stands 13.2 hands tall, with her sire being a pinto Shetland and her dam a 7/8 Arabian x 1/8 Thoroughbred. Given this information, we felt it a good bet that taking her to a small horse would still produce a foal within the pony range of 14.2 hands or less. Therefore, we opted to breed her to Ridley, as seen below.
Ridley is a small warmblood, standing only 15 hands. He has sired many foals, most from warmblood mares, who has stayed his size. Therefore, we felt we were not a risk for going oversize when crossed with Tessa.
He has a very pleasant overall balance with a slightly uphill tendency. His strong hip ties in well to a good back and his neck comes nicely out of his shoulder with a good length and clean throat latch. Though it is not the most important aspect of physical ability, he has a pleasantly refined head and nice expression. His attitude is reportedly very amiable and his work ethic very good. At last report, he has been schooling and successfully being shown in the FEI levels.
It is important to note that we spent years searching and researching prospects for Tessa. When looking to improve on her areas we had identified, as well as maintain her strengths AND stay within height it was a bit challenging to find the right match. Most of the pony stallions also share her same weakness of neck, and we were not about to double down on this conformational flaw. Add to this the fact that she is extremely difficult to settle with frozen (therefore ruling out stallions from Germany or other international countries) so the search for a domestic stallion for her to cross with took some time. Needless to say, we are very thankful when we found Ridley!
As far as our main goal of this breeding, first and foremost, we hope for a healthy foal and mare! After that, we would like that this match will produce a well-balanced, athletic pony or small horse that is of good mind and attitude suitable for dressage. A splash of color would be a bonus, but certainly not the purpose of this breeding. We have discussed retaining or selling the foal. That decision has not yet been finalized and will be heavily dependant on the gender of the foal. More on that at a later date.
With 7 1/2 weeks remaining, we will soon discover the results of all our hard work and analysis!!
***The conformation evaluation method used in this post is found in the book: 'Sport Horse Conformation; Evaluating Athletic Potential in Dressage, Jumping and Eventing Prospects' by Christian Schacht.