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The Thoroughbred horse off the track
Good or bad for breeding riding horses (Quarter horses, jumpers, dressage horses, etc.)?
I have come here to find out as much as I can on this subject.
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Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Jackie Cochran on
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Impuls has the look of TB outcrossing, the others besides Totillas like the Victorian age German Coach stallions.
In Europe, before the introduction of the TB, fine higher equitation horses had a lot of Barb blood. Of the hot bloods in existence then only the Barb was considered tops for crosses for riding qualities (Andalusians, Luisitanos, and Lippizaners all have Barb blood) for manege riding.
Then the English went to hot bloods in a big way, and from their importations of Barbs, Arabian, and Turkoman, possibly also mares descended from earlier hot blood importations, they developed the TB, in my opinion the finest riding horse ever developed. The French also had a lot of Barb and Arabian blood in breeding their riding horses. Then the TB, probably through the Turkomen blood, introduced heighth and longer strides.
Very few specimens of a hot blood breed will fulfill the conformation requirements to get into the warm blood stud books. The strength of the English breeders was they concentrated on hot blood first, racing speed second, and conformation a distant third. The physical demands of TB racing took this hot blood of faulty conformation and what came out was the wonderfully conformed TB, the fastest horse whose bodies had a chance to bear up under the harsh demands of racing.
We in the USA were lucky, we started off with the Barb blood (Spanish and French), added early TB blood close the the three founding sires, (Morgan, American Saddlebred, QH, Standardbred) and later got a Barb stallion that got into the Standardbred (*Linden Tree), and only later did we get much of the pure Arabian though we got a few Arab stallions early on too. So we have been pouring hot blood into all the non-draft breeds since our beginnings. Note that except through the TB we did not get the Turkoman blood, but the Turkoman type exists strongly in the ASB and Standardbred, through the TB.
I hope I am not boring you by telling you stuff you already know. I am really enjoying your references, it was good to finally see a conformation shot of Totillas.
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Permalink Reply by Elles Prins on
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The funny thing is that the German coach horse often decended from the English (Yorkshire) coach horse. Our Gelderlander always had a lot of German blood in it and also our Groninger (nearly extinct now). Often coming from the old Oldenburger type of horse. On the other hand it is said that the Friesian horse decends from Spanish blood.
I have once been on holiday to Mallorca and have rode Spanish type horses there. Nice horses but they were not of the best quality type of Andalusian.
I have a book about speed in the Thoroughbred horse and the writer thinks the speed came from the Irish Hobby (of Spanish/barb origin) one of the forefathers of the TB horse before peope.started importing the Arabians, Turks and pure Barbs. I love the Spanish type of horse like the Andalusian. I do academic dressage with my appendix QH and most people who train that type of dressage ride Friesian and Andalusian horses.
I also have a Tesio book and in it he writes that in the 19th century people again tried to breed in some Arabian blood but that these horses did not have the speed nor the stamina a TB does. In especially France there is a type of Arabian horse bred and used for racing but it looks more like a TB then it looks like an Arabian.
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The Trakehner breed for years (especially before WWII) used to be of exceptional quality and nobility. It was one of the best breeds bred for the army and used to have the most wonderful TB and Arabian blood in it.
You mentioned the American remount service. I have a book written about it. It also tells about the remount blood (like for example Chimney Sweep and Plaudit) that went into the QH breed. In the beginning when people in America started breeding QH's (horses for short racing) these horses did not trot but amble. The amble seems to have come from the Spanish origin but I am wondering why today's Spanish horses do not amble.
In the past I trained trotters for a while and Dutch trotters often have quite a lot of Standard bred blood and as you will know the Standardbred has a tendency to amble. Dutch trotters sometimes also have this trait.
Holland has always liked it's trotters and trotting races much more then the TB and racing.
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The Americas still have the old ambling blood in the Paso breeds. These horses have extremely strong Barb characteristics. Trotting blood did not take over in Europe until the TB plus improved roads requiring trotters to pull the new coaches.
The Standardbred probably got its ambling blood from the Canadian horse. The king of France had sent a lot of horses from his stud to the French Canadian colonies, including Barb and Arab blood, plus coach and draft horses. Justin Morgan's dam may have been a Canadian mare (crossed with a TB stallion), a lot of the horses in New England at that time were Canadian or descended from the Canadian Horse. There are still gaited (ambling) Canadian Horses. This blood, with its ambling abilities, were greatly favored in the American colonies because they could amble, much more comfortable to ride than a trotter, and this ability is in many American riding horse breeds.
There are also pure Arab lines that can easily be trained to amble. I trained two Al Khamsa Arabs (pure Davenports) to gait, it only took a few minutes for each of them. No high action, just a pleasant little trail gait.
Your Warmblood--half Anglo-Arab, sometimes people forget that Anglo-Arabs are pure hot bloods! (I am not including you in this statement.) I love them, my first horse was an Anglo-Arab, and his Arab half was probably Davenport, an Al-Khamsa breeding group. I love riding hot bloods, I am somewhat prejudiced for them.
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The Blunts of Crabbet Farm started importing desert Arabians partially with the thought that the English TB needed to have an outcross. At that time the English TB General Stud Book opened again to registration of the basic hot bloods, Arab, Barb and Turkoman. The descendents of these horses were slower than the pure English TB. Another reason that Wilfred Blunt wanted to import desert Arabians was to give the normal horse breeder access to hot blood. Many of the best TB stallions did not breed with non-TBs, and the stud fees of the good TB stallions were way beyond the reach of the normal Englishman. These Arabian stallions helped refine the basic English riding horse and pony.
I think there is still a small group of English Arabians who are descended solely from the Arabians registered in the English TB registry. I think they are all pure Crabbet but I may be wrong, there was at least one other Old English Arabian breeder whose horses were much less refined than the Crabbet stock. Several of the Arabian stallions registered in the GSB were proven race horses in India.
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Wow, Jackie you have a lot of knowledge!
I once owned a German riding pony gelding that had about 5/8 Arabian blood but in this case it was Asil blood (Egyptian origin). Among others he had Nazeer in his pedigree.
The army remount service also used to have some wonderful Arabians. I do like the Arabian but after getting more familiar with the TB horse I started to like them a bit more. However TB's often tend to have a downhill conformation while Arabians more often have an uphill conformation :
Ramzes was a great Shagya/TB cross, he left some very good sport horses behind. I don't know if you can call him an Anglo Arabian because I think Shagya's are not considered pure Arabian. There is a bit of Lippizaner and Thoroughbred in them. I have heard that the Shagya sometimes has a tendency to amble. I had no idea that Arabians had the least bit of amble in them.
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In the past we had Ramano in the Netherlands. Pedigree I was very much impressed with him. I remember as a teenager (in the 1980's) writing with his owner and saying I wanted to come and visit him. I did not do that in the end but it would have been wonderful seeing him with my own eyes. His only "problem" was that he was only 15.1 hands high.
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Somehow I always have a weakness for a grey thoroughbred maybe because it makes the horse look more like an arabian. In 2008 I got to see Cozzene, he was suffering badly from the skin cancer. But the Caro line of horse always makes me melt.
A few days ago I found this horse Martaline, isn't he beautiful? Caro is quite far back in his pedigree but still he has the wonderful Caro "look". When going back far enough in Caro's pedigree and following the grey horses in his pedigree one ends up with Le Sancy, who can also be found in the grey Rittersporn, sire of Ramzes. Le Sancy
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In Bonne Nuit we also find Le Sancy.
Sorry but I have a weakness for the grey TB and I can go on and on about it :-)
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Tesio did pedigree research on grey TBs. They all go back to the Alcock Arabian way, way back in the GSB.
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The pure Arab Skowronek son *Raseyn was trained as a 5-gaited horse at the Kellogg Ranch. He had a high action trot before being gaited, but when he learned to rack he transferred his high action to the rack.
Personally I look for a rectangular frame (short legs) and a fast walk that overstrides, the more the better. Then I wait until I feel something in my seat from the hind legs that feels different than the normal walk-trot transition. This is subtle. I have induced an easy gait in 3 pure Arabians and a 7/8 Arab. I was not able to get a easy gait from my Anglo-Arab though, he was more a square than a rectangle and had a slow walk. Usually I get a response the first or second time I use the aids asking for an easy gait, if they have the ability it is easy. If they don't nothing non-abusive will gait them.
Aren't the Shagyas gorgeous, and they get up to 16 hands. They fulfill all the fantasies European horsemen had about Arabs. I have never met or ridden one.
The next statement is purely my personal opinion--there is no substitution for pure Arab blood (Al Khamsa or Asil--almost the same breeding group). The pure Crabbet blood is the closest of the non-asil group (Egyptian/Blunt + Skowronek.) There is just something different about them in the way they relate to humans and in the way they can move. Even first genertion crossed are different from the pure Asil Arabs. Again, just my opinion.
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