Horse Connection

christine deherrera

"People will go to Europe and pay $250,000-$500,000 for a five or six year old jumper, but don’t want to spend $15,000 on a three year old,” says Jess Sweely, owner of Acorn Hill Farm in Madison, Virginia. American’s desire for instant gratification is just one of the challenges facing American breeders.

This challenge coupled with an overall lack of awareness of bloodlines and a lack of statistical data in the United States has been a source of frustration for many breeders. And while Sweely and the other breeders interviewed for this article have carefully chosen the best quality mares and crossed them with the best possible stallions, they are unfortunately lumped in with American breeders who still choose to breed unsound racetrack rejects or combine odd breeds and bloodlines.

However, the future is not as bleak as it once was. There are now several programs designed to highlight breeders and young horses, such as the popular International Hunter Futurity. As American breeders have taken advantage of the educational opportunities offered at keurings, association meetings and clinics, the overall quality of young horses produced has increased and the best American horses are on par with the best European horses. And while it is still fashionable to buy horses in Europe, the economic realities are forcing many buyers to stay home.

Success as a breeder may take decades, but for those who truly love this endeavor there is nothing more rewarding. In this exclusive Horse Connection article, four of America’s top breeding farms share the challenges and the joys of breeding in the United States.

Getting An Adequate Price

Sweely has been involved in breeding for thirty years with the last fifteen years devoted to making a success of a commercial operation. “I wasn’t about to go to Europe to spend $1 million for a grand prix jumper,” he explains of his interest in breeding. Taking advise from some of Europe’s most successful breeders, Sweely imported mares and stallions that represented top bloodlines with the goal of producing international show jumpers and now eventers.

Sweely had hoped to attract American buyers in search of their next top prospect, but has found that he “cannot get a fair price; people just won’t pay it.” He figures that he has $15,000 in his homebred youngsters by the time they are three years old. “You’d like to at least break even,” he says. With approximately 100 horses at his farm in Virginia and in Europe there truly is an opportunity for one stop shopping at Acorn Hill Farm, but Sweely finds that many people would still rather go to Europe and buy a horse that is already in training or showing. “People want to see a show record,” he says.

The European model of taking a horse from foal to show ring is very different from our American model. Sweely says that many European breeders are sending their young horses to Poland and Lithuania to develop because it is much less expensive. The large number of horse dealers in Europe is also very different from the American horse industry, which is focused on the training of amateur and junior riders. Many European breeders sell their foals and young horses to dealers who are equipped to bring them along. The horses are started and ridden by licensed bereiters. Top dealers even have international caliber riders to showcase their stock at national shows.

Tish Quirk of Carlsbad, California, echoes that sentiment, “Most [Americans] don’t buy young horses to develop. They buy to go into the show ring tomorrow.” Quirk has been importing and breeding horses since European horses first became popular in the United States and has a produced several generations of winners at the ‘A’ shows. And while she admires the European system, she believes it is a mistake for Americans to model themselves exclusively on the European way.

“I think [the United States] does a beautiful job starting young horses,” Quirk says. “I like the way we raise young horses better than the way they do it in Europe. We personally handle our babies every day.” It is common in Europe to find cow barns filled with 40 colts and 40 fillies that are herded in and out of the barn every day.

She continues, “Before we decided to model ourselves after Europe we won a lot in this country. I’d like to see American riders go to the Olympics on American bred horses. We did it before and we won the gold medal. We can do it again.”

Recently it has been fashionable to decry the lack of quality trainers in the United States as the root problem for American breeders’ lack of success. Yet, the breeders interviewed for this article all resoundingly said this was not the full story.

Not a Lack of Trainers, but Poor Financial Planning

While big name trainers may be on the road for thirty or more weeks per year and do not have the mechanism for creating superstars from unproven young horses, the overall problem may not be a lack of trainers, but a lack of finances. Many people who have bred a foal or purchased a young horse in order to save money have not set aside a budget that allows their horse to receive proper training. Although cost varies around the country, and of course there are ways to reduce expenses, owners should budget at least $1000 per month for training and board for a young horse. This does not include show costs, registration fees, veterinary care, shoeing, etc.

Meghan de Garay, a small breeder, as well as the office manager at Iron Spring Farm, the 2004 USEF leading breeder for both dressage and jumping horses, believes that it is a lack of realistic expectations that stymie many breeders. She says, “I am not a rider. I am realistic enough to know I need to sell the foal or keep it and bring it along. This is not inexpensive.”

For those willing to do proper financial planning, Quirk believes that there are many excellent young horse trainers. “There are people that are good at starting young horses,” she says. They may not be the big name at the horse show, but they are out there. She feels her location near Rancho Santa Fe, California has a “wealth of good horsemen.”

Quirk advises observing which trainers are working with the young horses at the horse shows. Then go to the farm for additional observation. “If you hang out with horses they will tell you if they are being treated nice,” she says. The key she says is to “do your homework and expect to spend some money.”

Be Proactive

Doing one’s homework is the key to success in other areas of this process. Europeans have easy access to seemingly endless volumes of statistics about which sires and dams produce which types of horses. This is not just a European trend; we have that same detailed information right here in the United States—for Thoroughbred racehorses.

Recognition of this weakness has resulted in the creation of a database that was originally the Performance Horse Registry and now is an official project of the USEF. “I have seen the national organization begin to make progress on tracking. You want things to be accomplished immediately, but it is a very big project,” Quirk says. In order for this endeavor to be successful the cooperation of many entities and individuals will be required.

Owners will need to know their horse’s sires, dams and damsires and provide the information to the national organizations. To help disseminate bloodline information horse show entry forms can have a space for sire, dam and breeder information, but trainers will need to fill in these blanks. These facts can be announced at the shows, along with other standard biographical data. “You will see this information in the World Cup program,” Quirk says. “With the FEI, it’s standard. It’s a matter of training people to acknowledge breeding. When you do, the same names will keep popping up.” The benefit is not only for breeders, but also for riders and trainers who can predict a horse’s talents based on its bloodlines.

Young Horse Programs

Programs like the International Hunter Futurity and the International Jumper Futurity have highlighted young jumping talent for nearly two decades. Recently the FEI tests for five and six year old dressage horses have had more entries and the Dressage at Devon “Born in the USA” breeders awards have distributed more than $5000 to horses conceived and born in the United States since 2003.

Quirk feels that these programs are beneficial for both breeders and horses. “Everyone that is breeding horses wants to show them off. It’s good for the horses. It’s an adventure and if done right is an easy introduction to the horse shows.”
These programs as well as better education for mare owners has resulted in an overall improvement in quality of American foals over the last ten years.

More Educated

“Breeders are becoming more educated that a good mare is essential,” says Willy Arts of DG Bar Ranch in California, a leading producer of dressage horses for more than twenty years. Arts feels that mares are now being selected based on character and rideability as well as soundness. Arts finds that breeders are more astute as to what soundness issues are inherited and being much more selective in breeding. The education process has also helped breeders represent their horses more accurately. Not every horse is international quality, but if properly represented can find a good home.

Arts also believes that his involvement in all aspects of the horse industry--breeder, trainer, seller, buyer, and organization member—has helped him be successful in the industry. Although he feels that American breeders do not get recognition that they would in Europe, his steady presence at the horse shows, including taking the grand championship at the prestigious Dressage at Devon in 2003, has meant that buyers seek him out.

More Buyers Staying Home

With the current strength of the Euro and weakness of the dollar, it costs approximately $15,000 to import a horse from Europe. For many buyers of moderate priced horses this now puts European horses out of reach. These buyers will be looking for quality young horses right here in the Untied States. “There is still the prestige and magic of importing from Europe,” Quirk says, but American breeders that have established themselves as a source for quality horses will reap the benefits of this trend.

While the sport horse breeding industry in the United States is young and challenging, the joy of creating beautiful horses for owners to enjoy is worth the effort. Tish Quirk says, “There is nothing that is more personally and emotionally rewarding than producing success at any level. There just couldn’t be any better partners in this endeavor than horses.”