breeding question
 

have you heard of mares not taking to thier babys and refusing to do the dutys of mom.....

Yes... we almost lost a foal because of it. This is going to sound weird, but we had a goat on the farm that had just had her baby weaned and luckily she took to the filly. It saved her life...

Happens a lot...leads to the practice on some farms where they breed a cheap mare and kill the foal just so she's got milk for a more "expensive" foal!

From my own experience, yes.
One of my broodmares is a terrible mother. She needs to be tied to the wall of the stall so she doesn't kick her baby. She thinks the baby is going to steal her hay.
She allows the baby to nurse, once the hay is gone.
Out in the pasture, she's fine.

Very sad. They often use a surrogate mare, but sometimes leasing the surrogate costs more than the foal.

thanks ..have the horses grown up to be normal or massive head cases....

Actually, once the filly was weaned, she became "normal". She likes people and is very gentle. She even puts her head on my shoulder (horse hug) if I have a mint.

Normal as long as they are weaned earlier... the important thing is that the foal learns how to be a horse and learns proper herd behavior.

i thought if a horse had a stable family and nice herd he would prosper...so after they are weaned ..it doesnt matter who they hang with...lol

No, it shouldn't matter. Also, there are milk supplements you can buy to help the foal along in case he/she isn't getting enough milk from mom.

Actually, once they're weaned it matters a lot as to which "group" they hang with. They have a "pecking" order.
Another mare went after one other mare's foals, a filly. Bad situation.
We never put her in that group again.
The colts have a "baby sitter", a retired polo pony that looks after them.
He keeps them calm.

Yeah, but once they're weaned, they're aren't supposed to be out with adult mares... :confused:

Normally, you will have a group of weanlings together.

thats cool dts..if you put them with the higher end kind do you think it would make them better..in order to keep up in the dashes around the yard it would probebly make them faster.. no what i mean..you are as good as the people you hang with lol

I'm just saying what we do at the farm. About a month after they are weaned, especially the fillies, they are put back in the same pasture with their mothers. Their moms give them comfort. And no, they don't try to nurse anymore. The mom becomes their "buddy".

And yes, Hooves, the babies all challenge each other to race around the pastures. It's kind of like, "let's see what you've got?"

Just my experience.

DTS

interesting..

I've never seen that done before, but whatever works, right?

That's how it's been done at the farm for as long as I've been involved there.
Seems to work out fine.
The colts and the fillies are seperated at about 9 months.
Fillies with their moms, colts with their "baby sitter".

Colts need all the babysitting they can get! LOL

No joke. My wife deals with weanlings and those boys chop each other up. Have to stitch them up sometimes.

That retired polo pony, Durante, is really a good baby sitter.
It's so funny. He is like the "Protector". Just grazes, lifts his head once in a while to see who's winning the race along the fenceline.
He keeps them calm, and doesn't take any "back talk".

You have some interesting stories, but some of the weanling colts are lunatics and do whatever they want.

Yup! Some are complete lunatics. Bite and kick for fun. That's how they "talk" to each other.

That's really fasinating. Very discriptive too. I was picturing these little guys and gals out racing eachother in the field, bragging like kids on a playground. Funny how the boys fight and bicker. Do they have one that picks on the others, knd of like a bully?

hooves, don't worry dude, your mom loves you, it's just tough love and it's for your own good.

Just my take...colts, they're ALL bullies.
They don't stop with each other.

lol ateam ..tough love running around fast so my mare doesnt geld me..:cool:

Yep, this is one of the reasons that there is such things as nurse mares....a lot of nurse mares are just cheap Belgium horses that can really provide good natural nourishment to foals if the original broodmare dies or does the rare refusal to take on her foal....

the ideal nurse mare should be a draft cross as opposed to a pure draft. That way one can get the benefits of the draft horse easy going nature while NOT getting a mare that will produce so much milk that it puts the TB foal at risk for excessive growth and therefore OCD...
And in my experience the foal will only accept one or the other--meaning if it goes on a nurse mare it won't bottle/bucket feed or if it's on a bottle too long it won't go back to the mare to feed.

Like some human moms, equine moms can be derelict in their duties.

My mare used to go out with a mom and foal. The mom wasn't very good at being a mom so my mare was sort of like the surrogate aunt. She would put the baby in line if it was acting up. I'm sure most places do not recommend putting a mare with no baby out with a nursing mare, but in this situation there were no adverse effects.