On the Manipulation of the Gene Pool On the Manipulation of the Gene Pool Long ago in England, those ancient times were fruitful, ripe, and bursting for the creation of an archetype. The horse was not only of central importance in an agrarian society, but was of strategic military value. Those having the tools of war and the mobility represented by the light-horse could defend themselves as well as wage war on their enemies. The conquering Romans landed in Britain about 55 BC, roughly, sixteen hundred years before the origin of the Thoroughbred. They occupied Britain for about 500 years, during which time, the stage was set with the advancements of animal husbandry, selective breeding, horsemanship skills, competition, and horse racing. Importation of different breeds of horse from other parts of the Roman Empire were instrumental for the foundation of a new, royal breed of horse. Precedence was there and the time was right for the beginnings of the Thoroughbred horse. When English royalty became strongly attracted to organized horse racing, the inevitability of the birth of the Thoroughbred was assured. King Alfred appointed the first royal Master of Horse about 900 AD. John F. Wall states that Henry VIII is credited with establishing the Royal Studs at various places in England. A thousand years after the birth of Christ, history paused with baited breath, for the curtain was about to go up...
The Thoroughbred, the archetype, came into existence in the early 1600's and was probably established as a breed by about 1750 when Eastern sires fell from favor due to a lack of speed compared to the new breed, the Thoro-Bred, which they had help develop. The British royalty ruling an agrarian society essentially mandated a national focus for the development of the highest quality racehorses. A long term, royal mandate was the improvement of the horse through selective breeding of all classes of horses, from ponies to draft horses implemented through the continued development of the Thoro-Bred. Whether or not early horse breeders fully realized the magnitude of their creation, the Thoroughbred, its continued impact on mankind, or its historical longevity, they were, of course, horsemen. Like all horsemen in all times, they were conveyed beyond words by the emotions that are embodied in the horse. The romance of the horse and its heroic achievements throughout history have transcended all aspects of society, all manners of culture, and have done so in all corners of the world where the horse can exist. Few of nature's creatures have such an empathetic bond with mankind. The Thoroughbred has been definitive in its transcendence over all horses that came before.
The Thoroughbred is a man-made, hybrid animal originating from a closed breeding population. It has been said that at least several strains of the Arab, Barb, Galloway, draft-types such as the native English war-horse, descendants of the horses imported during the Roman invasion of England, etc., and possibly others, are among those that made some contribution to the new breed. Regardless of the intrinsic qualities of the breeds of horse that contributed their genetics to the origins of the Thoroughbred, there appeared to be incredibly strong, dormant forces lurking beneath the surface that just needed an excuse to biologically express. Perhaps, early breeders were astounded at what they had wrought. Whether the phrase, "hybrid vigor", adequately explains what happened or not is in doubt, in my mind, so strong and dramatic was the progression of early development. In a relatively short time, the characteristics of the Thoroughbred spontaneously expressed themselves strongly, rapidly, and dramatically. It was apparent to horsemen of the era that the Thoroughbred quickly became remarkably different in physical and mental characteristics than it's antecedents. Severe selection on the part of early breeders, severe training methods common to the era, and the athleticism and rigor of the winning post probably were very important factors. But regardless, once the genie escaped from the bottle, it became impossible to either go back or to add any additional, original strains to increase the size of the gene pool. Horses of the new breed were bigger and better in all ways suited for winning races. As the breed came into existence, governing bodies for the breed became established, and the breeding population became closed. The Thoroughbred remarkably exceeded the potential of their ancestors to such a degree that further infusions of progenitors blood was no longer genetically possible. Once the Thoroughbred became established, latter attempts (A. Keene Richards, etc.) to add additional genetic elements failed and further attempts in the future will just as surely fail. For good or bad, the breed has become fixed in its unique and mostly superior characteristics. Just how critical the issue of the closed breeding population is unknown, but probably a minor factor. All modern Thoroughbreds trace to approximately 80 foundation horses, including three principle stallions: the Godolphin Arabian, the Darley Arabian, and the Byerley Turk. Cunninham also includes a fourth stallion: the Curwen Bay Barb. These four stallions contribute approximately one third of the genes of the modern Thoroughbred.
The Thoroughbred, born to nobility, quickly eclipsed all in speed and stamina. The horsemen of the era did not have any articulated, clear cut single strategy governing the creation of the Thoroughbred (other than the usual desire of all horsemen to win). Mankind's horse breeding experiments, intended to provide suitable entertainment for the diversion and amusement of the nobility, serendipitously unleashed overwhelming, dormant genetic potential. This potential hidden in the early horse became expressed in the Thoroughbred. Early horsemen soon realized that mating practices developed for and used with purebred animals did not work with hybrids. Special breeding theories were devised for successfully reproducing desirable performance traits. The early breeders learned the secrets of breeding the hybrid for consistent racing success. Unfortunately, over time these secrets became lost, or if known, fell into disrepute, or became forgotten. Breeders migrated eventually toward less reliable, less effective or nearly random mating strategies. Deliberate breeding of the Elite became more hit or miss.
Early Thoroughbreds had no real speed in the modern sense nor need for speed until 3- and 4-mile heat racing fell out of popularity in the nineteenth century, in favor of single races of shorter distances. Thoroughbred racing, a sport of royalty and the nobility, was originally a gentlemanly game in which the horses cantered or plodded around the course until the field made a 3/8 or 1/4 sprint to the winning post to decide the winner. The most important component of the seventeenth and eighteenth century race horse was stamina. At that time, speed was more along the lines of Tesio's concept of "a burst of speed" able to be given at asking at any point during a race, but usually at the finish of the race, rather than sustained, maximum speed or acceleration from a standing start to the winning post (such as in modern quarterhorse racing). Sprinting distances and speed were not then or now synonymous. The desire to win wasn't just an attribute of the human animal; the racehorses shared with their owners the same competitive spirit. Early accounts indicate that, once in the heat of competition, some of the etiquette and gentlemanly behavior went out the window. Jockeys and gentlemen-riders apparently threw out the rules as they made their run to the winning post in any way they could. Speed quickly became the historic imperative and the preoccupation with it since has collided with destructive effect upon the fragile Thoroughbred.
For a number of reasons there has been a trend in placed for about 100 - 150 years for two genetic conditions in the Thoroughbred general breeding population. There has been the dominant theme and general practice of heterozygousity or outcrossing within the general population over ten to fifteen generations as a reaction to previous incestuous practices. Additionally, when inbreeding has occurred, during this time period, there has been an accumulation of excess, unbalanced, male-linked, inbreeding. One reason for the accumulation of excess male inbreeding, is that due to limited numbers of mares and possible progeny, it is very difficult to inbreed to quality females as a major strategy. Usually, in the real world there are insufficient descendants from great matriarchs to extensively practice inbreeding to females.
Prior to the American Civil War, in both America and England, it was common for indiscriminate inbreeding to be destructively practiced to harmful excess. The harm in incestuous inbreeding soon became evident to many horsemen. In the twentieth century, the very strong influence of the written opinions of Joe Estes, editor of The Bloodhorse, (and others), was an additional factor that changed breeding practices. Estes, an influential writer, was extremely critical of prevalent breeding theories. As a result, the breeding practices of outcrossing, disregarding the concepts of sex balance, sex-linkages, and re-enforcement of maternal strains in pedigrees became a dominant theme to the current day. In my opinion, this has harmfully diluted the major strains, confused and disorganized previously great bloodlines and may be a contributing factor to the claims of increasing unsoundness and supposed decline in today's Thoroughbred. Estes popularized "Breed the best to the best and hope for the best..." and "Racing performance is the best guide to probable breeding performance..." etc., etc. Estes was so strongly opinionated from his powerful position as editor of The Bloodhorse, that he derided any other theories and strongly influenced generations of horsemen. He wrote in "A Quarter-Century of American Racing", the Silver Anniversary Supplement to The Blood-Horse of August 30, 1941:
"The appetite for a solution worthy of the mystery has not gone without gratification, however. In Australia the late Bruce Lowe worked out a denouement, as the short story writers used to call it, that was a corker. It had everything - profundity, mathematics, action, suspense, and intricacy, and enough simplicity that there was no one so foolish but that he could grasp the main plot. Col. J. Vuillier (Lottery was his significant pen name) had one that was even better for mathematics, profundity, suspense, and intricacy, but it wasn't simple enough for popular consumption, and the man who was smart enough to understand it was usually smart enough to know better. But it was a honey."
...and..
"What I am attempting is to prepare the reader for the conclusion that there is no conclusion to the study of pedigrees."
Many American breeders reacted badly to the more strident and belligerent of the Bruce Lowe extremists and advocates since many so-called, "American families" had not been examined by Lowe prior to his untimely death. American yearlings were exported to England around the turn of the century, selling poorly since there were no Lowe American female family numbers. Some of the Lowe followers (unlike Lowe himself) became very rigidly entwined in a complex "family numbers" formula for analyzing pedigrees. Many ignored the qualities of the individual in their pursuit of a magic formula. There was a time following the publication of Lowe's book of extreme controversy and recrimination among breeders in England and America. The despised Jersey Act was passed by English breeders against the flood of American bloodstock in England. Racing in American very nearly died in 1911 - 1912, due to repressive legislation. World War I followed in 1914 - 18. Horse racing staggered back on its feet about 1916.
From a historical perspective, while individual horses have not been as lucky, the Thoroughbred gene pool as a whole, has been quite elastic and adaptive to the abuses and insults of owners, trainers, breeders and other horsemen. Somehow, it has had the bulldogged tenacity of survival. Over time, it has responded quite well to the pressure and demands of mankind with regard to changing styles of racing. Genes are either expressed or not; great racehorses are born or not, but, are any of us so wise and expert that we can make breed shaping pronouncements - and upon what expert knowledge based upon what proofs should we make these judgments? What would past horsemen and what will future horsemen think about our wisdom and our stewardship of the breed? The connection between greatness of one era to the next often hang upon slender threads of fortuitous luck, chance circumstance, unforeseen events: the broke-down racehorse saved for stud duty, the lesser sire or failure exported to greener pastures, the mare who simply could not run fast enough but became a matriarch when given a long shot chance to produce, the less glamorous full brother to a top performer, the sire-to-be exported in-utero to avoid a world war, out-of-fashion bloodlines responding to significant changes in the style of racing, etc. Perhaps, there might be wisdom in a law to prevent squandering of the breeding opportunities of great mares? But, who are we to pass judgment? Are we so vain or arrogant? I, for one, don't presume to know the answers. Trans-hemisphere shuttling of stallions and extremely large bookings for the elite sires - these are other modern issues - should restrictions be placed upon commerce of the Thoroughbred? In the historical long run, it's probably biologically irrelevant. Furthermore, the altruistic or otherwise tampering with the breed by latter-day well-meaning horsemen with that most noble of mankind's biological creations, the Thoroughbred horse, has largely been ill-advised, ill-conceived, and fortunately, historically relatively meaningless.
Should we view the state of affairs of the Thoroughbred from today's perspective or from a long term, historical perspective? Even with current advancements in molecular cyto-genetics, can we be sure we are as wise as Mother Nature? It would be a naive arrogance and a conceit to respond too quickly with an all-knowing yes. Be assured there are plenty of mysteries left to confound us. Are we so sure of ourselves or so smart to want to attempt to manipulate the gene pool of the Thoroughbred on any large scale? If such were the case, for what factors would we select - would we be wise enough to know beyond reasonable doubt the correctness of our decisions for the future of the breed? I don't think anyone today would really want to return to 4 mile heat-racing and its plodding style of running as was done in the early 1800's and before. Racing seemed a severe and cruel sport in the early days. Accounts of training methods seem incredibly harsh, severe and abusive. Like in cock-fighting, the losers too-often ended up on the stone-cold heap of defeat. They buried many of their culls, often in grueling training long before the horse ever attempted to race, but can we say that today we're too humane? While each horseman needs to approach the biological entities known as horses with love and respect, in our days of equine population explosion, the culls must still fall along the wayside, if we are to be true to the spirit and nobility of all of the Thoroughbred ancestral greats preceding today's horses. Would it be more humane to not breed the failure or send the failure to a different life before tragedy struck? Therein lies the rub...
According to statistics that stay relatively constant over time, approximately half of all Thoroughbreds bred produce live foals, about half the foals that are born will start in a race, of those, only about 25 per cent will win a race, and less than one tenth of one per cent will go on to represent the Elite. In addition, the above statistic surely should underscore the importance of culling one's stock. Breed for achievement but cull for survival (the economic survival of the breeder and the health of his wallet). If, as breeders we cannot survive, our stewardship of the breed becomes irrelevant.
Fortunately, for all the "do-gooders" wanting to idealistically manipulate the gene pool of the Thoroughbred, whether well-intentioned or not, I'm happy to opinionate, whether my advice is wanted or not. The following truisms might provide a useful framework or context for further thought:
Animal improvement through selective breeding practices is probably as old as the first domestication of animals by early man. There is little reason to doubt that man has been meddling in the affairs of all domesticated animals, practically since the beginning. Game cocks, cattle, and dogs are just a few of the species, that have provided genetic insight to early horse breeders long before the creation of the Thoroughbred. Eventually, mating practices that involved domesticated horses prior to the creation of the Thoroughbred, produced better, more useful results. Progeny improvement became apparent to early horse breeders who quickly discarded undesirable individuals and practices. The problem then as well as now, is that biological science has only recently begun to catch up with the anecdotal theories of Thoroughbred breeders. There has been little consistent body of teachings or documentation from one generation of horse breeder to the next, from which to learn so that each new generation of breeder does not have to start anew. Later (about the sixteenth and seventeenth century), during the creation of the breed now called the Thoroughbred, breeders were just as relentless in their pursuit of theories, correct and incorrect, working with the anecdotal body of knowledge gleaned from the earliest breeders of domesticated horses. Horse facts were mixed with myths and misconceptions, truth with falsehood and half-truths. Man's perception of the Thoroughbred had to graduate from livestock to athlete. Selective breeding practices of one kind or another mixed with zealous ideologies rightly or wrongly have been responsible for both the most glorious and most ignominious moments in the history of the Thoroughbred.
Random dispersion of key genetic performance factors throughout the Thoroughbred gene pool, ease of the accumulation of male inbreeding in typical mating practices, resulting saturation of the Thoroughbred gene pool with male inbreeding, and difficulty of reinforcement of easily diminished female factors are some of the impediments to breeding a quality racehorse. Many breeders have ignored the lessons of the past by weakening the Thoroughbred with dilution through relatively randomized outcrossing, failure to utilize sex-linkage in mating strategies, and failure to fully appreciate maternal contribution.
Key genetic performance factors in Thoroughbreds are now dispersed through the breeding population with little or no recognizable pattern. So many cumulative selection errors, random matings, or uninformed mating decisions have been made by so many breeders over hundreds of years that the current genetic pool of the Thoroughbred is randomized and disorganized. Due to the relative ease in accumulating inbreeding to males, the current breeding population worldwide is saturated with male inbreeding. Accumulation and reinforcement of female factors is correspondingly difficult. For female factors to be reinforced, the breeder must make special efforts and additionally, sufficient ancestral members having kinship to meritorious females must exist. Also, the trend toward greater heterozygosity (outcrossing) for the last 125 - 150 years has increased the disorganization still further. Key genetic performance factors result from exceedingly complex blending of myriad genes. Even with today's sophisticated molecular cytogenetics, the exact genes and the relationship to racing performance still are unexplained and somewhat mysterious. Performance factors have become even less perfectly organized than in earlier times and, in fact, are dispersed through the breeding population with little recognizable pattern left.
Many of the very earliest breeders, reflecting the chauvinistic society of the times, failed to appreciate the genetic role of the female in the production of high class progeny. They were, however, relentless in their genetic experimenting and attempts at breed improvements. The importance of maternal contribution eventually became apparent to some of the most perspicacious of the breeders. Breeding strategies that maximize progeny performance became revealed to the lucky few possibly through inevitable discovery. This became their secret weapon through which they dominated their contemporaries.
Edward Stanley, the 12th Lord Derby (1752 - 1834) is considered by many theorists to have ruined through incestuous inbreeding of her son and daughters, the elite, maternal bloodline of Papillon 1769, by Snap x Miss Cleveland, by Regulus, widely regarded as the very best broodmare line of the times. Her line (from the Darley Arabian) only survived briefly through her son, Sir Peter Teazle. Her daughters could not withstand the severe inbreeding depression caused by being mated to their own brother. Historical breeding records as well as geneticists demonstrate that, while incestuous inbreeding is extremely destructive, the type of near-inbreeding, often referred to as "linebreeding" can be a highly successful breeding practice. Specific types of inbreeding increase the probability that factors that breeders may wish to strengthen will be expressed while avoiding inbreeding depression and reinforcement of negative factors.
At one time, considerable inbreeding to St. Simon without balancing female inbreeding was a popular practice that led some breeders (such as M. Marcel Boussac and others) into apparent, genetic dead-ends. Excessive inbreeding to males generally results in progeny no better than average. On the other hand, many other breeders have achieved the most absolutely remarkable results using balanced inbreeding practices. Edward G. V. Stanley, the seventeenth Lord Derby (prominent years as a breeder: 1913 - 1945) redeemed his forebear' errors with some of the greatest achievements in the history of the breed. The results of the mating strategies of Federico Tesio are equally remarkable. Their selection methods bear study if the breeder is to be successful.
It's easy to complain of the decreasing scope of the diversity of the Thoroughbred, but tough on the bank account to go against the grain of current fashion. The altruistic but poor economics involving the preservation of unpopular bloodlines and the attempted sale of resulting progeny will surely send the idealistic breeder into the poorhouse much more rapidly than is otherwise possible.. The long term harm to the genetic pool of the Thoroughbred from breeding fashionably is caused by greed, desire for short-term gain and paucity of reliable breeding knowledge. This negligent form of horse breeding is destructive to the diversity of the genetic pool of the Thoroughbred and is one of the reasons for the fall of many of the formerly great, historical bloodlines. Simple opposite sex inbreeding and balanced inbreeding to the strengths in the pedigree of sires could be an important factor in the preservation of most of the existing tail-male sirelines, if, indeed, such preservation has any relevance to the preservation of the breed. The current genetic pool lacks sex-linked, balanced reinforcement or sufficient female inbreeding.
Successful racehorses can often result from clever duplications within 3 to 6 generations and opposite-sex linkages probably more than any other breeding scheme. I don't think there is any need for the destruction of diversity or the loss of any of the tail-male sirelines or matriarchal female lines, but it may be irrelevant if the intelligent breeder with a king's resources could create new tail-mail sirelines or matriarchies from the best of the current elite. By hewing to the higher road through intelligent mating strategies involving selective reinforcement, the diversity of the breed can be carefully maintained to the greater good and preservation of the Thoroughbred without harming the breeder's wallet. Ironic that the criticized practice of inbreeding, the employment of which narrows or concentrates the gene pool in the individual, could be the salvation of diversity in the gene pool of the entire population through preservation of existing strains. All Thoroughbred blood lines must pass the pragmatic test of the winning post, so, obviously only those most successful at racing will be allowed to pass their genes on to the next generations. Since no one wants failure, there is even more pressure on planning correct matings for all strains, fashionable or not. The less fashionable strains may be kept competitive and, therefore, survive through the vehicle of careful reinforcement strategies.
There is nothing that can be or should be done about the "background noise" of absolute inbreeding in the Thoroughbred. That is the genetic baggage that all Thoroughbreds carry. If you love the Thoroughbred, you have to accept it. Most of it occurred over two hundred years ago, near the beginnings of the breed. Whether or not it has deleterious results on today's thoroughbred is a debatably futile and useless argument. Absolute inbreeding is unimportant to the success or failure of today's racing or breeding horses. What's important is the RELATIVE inbreeding of the current individual target compared to the mean inbreeding for the entire, current population and the types and amounts of inbreeding within the ancestral sliding window specific to that individual. It's likely that the explosion in the Thoroughbred population since about the late 1800's, greater relative heterozygousity in a majority of the current population, modern horsemen's obsessive quest for speed and precocity, and less severe culling of inferior stock for the last one hundred-fifty years is more likely to be responsible for the increased fragility, poor performance, etc. of today's racehorse.
The Thoroughbred gene pool, for the most part, is doing quite fine, in this era of approximately 125-150 years of increased heterozygousity. I would venture a contrarian opinion that the "unsoundness" and "decline of the breed" that seems to be so fashionable a subject, are merely manifestations of increased heterozygosity caused by a 125 - 150 year backlash to excessive inbreeding popular in the 1800's and an equally strong, unwillingness to cull the failures, whether for economic or other reasons.. It strikes me that returning to the strategies that created the historically best Thoroughbreds is to a large extent the correction required. Opposite sex inbreeding, reinforcement of Matriarchs, preservation of the Lowe female families, increased culling of failures are some of the good practices of horsemanship that are required. Clever duplications and reinforcements of key ancestors (especially females) have a higher probability of success than any single other mating strategy.
Superior production related to tail-male sirelines in a hybrid animal such as the Thoroughbred tend to be fugitive (impermanent) over time, so I wouldn't get too sad over the eventual demise of those elite that have their brief moment in the sun. Racing dominance that traces in tail-male descendancy tends to be sort of a Darwinian battle or survival of the fittest. Success at racing and success at siring are traits that tend to be linked in the male. When one bloodline fails to dominate, another will step in to shoulder the mantle of success. Tail-male dominance seems to follow Abram Hewett's "wave theory" as its successes rise and fall. Harold Hampton, among others, also recognized that tail-male lines are not generally durable past 5 - 6 generations at the top level while tail-female bloodlines seem to contain very durable genetic elements. His comments are on page 43 of his 2nd book. The Y chromosome can only be transmitted through males. It is the vehicle for the genetic durability of the tail-male bloodline. The permanence of the genes transmitted through tail-male descendancy is unrelated to transmission of either dominance qualities or the continued highest qualities of racing performance. If anything, one should be sad over the demise of any tail-female line. Like a free-market economy or a meritocracy, the worth of breeding stock is highly dependent on their production success or failure. The ultimate test of the genetic contribution of the individual is, first, its response to racing opportunity then, second, breeding opportunity.
Contrary to the transient dominance of Elite, tail-male sirelines, when the great Matriarch (or tail-female bloodline) fails to breed sufficient sons and daughters to carry on her genetics, it is truly a tragedy for the breed as a whole. Given sufficient reproduction, the permanence of maternal contribution can be demonstrated in some cases for fifteen or more generations. The key for any breeder is to have the opportunity to practice opposite sex-inbreeding to these prepotent females. In order to accomplish this, plenty of descendants of the great mare (that trace to both her sons and daughters) must be available in the current breeding population. Matriarchy's survival depends solely on fecundity (ability to produce progeny) , for the strength of mitochondrial inheritance is perhaps the most enduring of all biological forces and will prevail, given the chance.
Damlines producing the most successful progeny (Elites), can be shown to be the most important and the most biologically durable component historically. For example, the incredibly successful tail-female line of Fall Aspen may be traced in direct female descent to Maggie B.B. 1867, both are Matriarchs of the very highest quality, and continuously, females in-between have compiled an amazing string of superior production. In the examination of this progeny tree, you will be amazed at the almost continuous production of top performers through over 15 generations that separate Fall Aspen from Maggie B.B. The tail-female line of *La Troienne 1917 is another first class example. That this phenomena exists violates Mendelian genetic principles and is one of the macro-proofs for non-nuclear, mitochondrial inheritance. Special types of inbreeding involving the reinforcement of females have been identified as key strategies by which many top performers can be created. After a one hundred-fifty year trend of heterozygosity, let's put a little fun back in the game!
Nicking affinity is the term used to explain when there is complementary combining of relatively unrelated strains resulting in greater numbers of superior progeny than expected. Where nicking occurs, there seems to no only be increased probabilities for greater numbers of superior individuals among the progeny, but also other manifestations of superiority. I think I've observed other, less well known benefits attributable to nicking. Positive nicking can result in corrections for conformation and mental defects in both strains, where the resulting progeny has better conformation and behavior than either of the parents. Both correct inbreeding and nicking affinities can apparently have this ability to "fix-up" at least in superior progeny (not in all progeny and probably not as reliably as horsemen might wish), the existing physical defects in parent's bloodlines.
On the decline of the breed, possible deleterious effects of inbreeding, small, closed genetic pool of the Thoroughbred, recharging with fresh genes outside the breed, perhaps we should reflect on the words of Federico Tesio. He states on page 59 of his book, "Breeding the Race-Horse", edited and translated by Edward Spinola, published by J. A. Allen, London, 1958:
"From the day the Stud-Book was closed by the Jockey Club, it was reopened only once, at the beginning of the 19th century, to admit a small group of Arabian horses.
"The experiment raised expectations of fabulous results - the so-called restocking of the breed. It proved a dismal failure. The resulting products lost both speed and staying power and the new Arabian blood ended by virtually eliminating itself. Its descendants were incapable of winning good races so they were discarded and forgotten. A hundred years of scientific selection at the finishing post had proved more effective than a hundred years of practical selection in the desert.
It is true that later a few well-known American horses were granted admission to the Stud-Book and that these proved worthy of the honor. But it is quite possible that they were entitled to it in the first place and were merely unable to prove their claim because their papers had been lost at the time of the Mayflower or of the Marquis de Lafayette."
In the article, "Keene Richards' Arabian Importations", by Thornton Chard, published in Jan/Feb 1935 issue of The Horse,
Speed (a nom de plume) says:
"What gave the Arab horse a kind of disrepute in America was the experiment of A. Keene Richards. Mr. Richards was a man of wealth and education and a breeder of race-horses in the Blue Grass Section of Kentucky. In studying the history of the English Thoroughbred he came to the conclusion he would like to get fresh infusions of the original blood. He went to Arabia and personally selected several stallions. These he mated with his Thoroughbred mares, and when the colts were old enough he entered them in the races. They were not fast enough to win even when conceded weight. He went again, this time was about 1855, taking with him the animal painter Troye. They took their time, and came back with a superior lot. Mr. Richards tried over again the same experiment with the same result. The colts did not have the speed to beat the Thoroughbreds."
Abram Hewett in his book, "Great Breeders and Their Methods", writes that "Richards was thought to be the richest man in Kentucky at that time.", and was the owner of *Glencoe and imported *Australian (sire of the great Matriarch, Maggie B.B.).
And, again, re-quoted from Thornton Chard, the following by Robert S. Sievier:
"I venture to fear that what is commonly accepted as the Thoroughbred is today not as good as he was yesterday."
"To return to the foundation after about a century's lapse would be the re-uniting of blood which has made the British breed the foremost in the world, and its fresh transmission might, in the fullness of time, give us yet another Ormond, St. Simon, Persimmon, and a legion of others, the prototype of which are not discoverable in this year of grace."
Yet, it was far too late. Like a broken record, needle skipping in the same tired groove, citations from critics of the Thoroughbred have been made almost continuously from very nearly the beginnings of the Thoroughbred about such issues as inferiority of current race horses, unsoundness, lack of stamina, inability to carry weight, deterioration of the breed. John Wall, in "Breeding Thoroughbreds", wrote,
"King Charles II directed the British Ambassador at Constatinople to procure Arabians for the Royal Stud. A cry of "too much speed and no bone" had its origin just about that time. But the old English horse was on the way out. (referring to the "Royal" or old English blood - l.b.)"
Many have been critical of the closed breeding population and the apparently limited gene pool of the Thoroughbred. Perhaps, the most damning and most credible, is the accusation of horsemen's' insane pursuit of speed. Jay Leimbach, of West Chester, Pa. (author of the column, "Morris, Porter miss all points", June 12, 1997 issue of the Daily Racing Form) is only the latest in a long tradition of ill-advised and presumptuous critics claiming to know what best for the breed.
Casual contemplation of relationships between causality, genetics, racing performance, and breeding theories deserves caution. In fact, a breeder should be very cautious, lest he become fooled by false cause-and-effect.
Discrete events can occur in close proximity along the historical timeline. Proximity may seem to indicate a temporal relationship, so therefore there must be causality? In fact there may or may not be any real relationship. The discrete events may have occurred randomly. Causality is not implied nor proved. Don't be fooled. The author, T.S. Eliot said, "We had the experience but missed the meaning."
Among contemporary
Thoroughbreds, the range of decline or
deterioration from the best of today's Elite performers to the
worst of today's failures may be greater, more significant, and
more worthy of research than any questionable, historical trend
of decline or deterioration in the breed from Thoroughbreds in
the seventeenth century compared to those of today. The modern
obsession with speed, the breeding strategy of greed, the failure
to sufficiently cull the failures, the long term, historical
trend of heterozygosity (125 -150 years) combined with the
extreme reproduction variability inherent in the hybrid may be
more likely implicated as possible causes for unsoundness, lack
of stamina, weight carrying ability, than any limits to the gene
pool or the closed breeding population.
© Copyright 1998 by Loren Bolinger, All Rights Reserved
author of:
"Performance Kinship - Advanced Mating Strategies"
Running Horse Farm
7102 Ilfield Road Southwest
Albuquerque, New Mexico 87105-7046
505-873-2220 Voice
505-877-4443 FAX
e-mail: sunshow@rt66.com