Porsche or Dacia?
How often have I heard it: ‘You can’t ride a piece of paper.’ Really? That’s a bit like saying, ‘Your Porsche is in no way better than my Dacia, because they both get me from A to B.’ But the truth is, the Porsche brand stands for specific qualities—horsepower, speed, luxury. The Dacia brand, on the other hand, stands more for simplicity, robustness, and reliability. It is quite similar when it comes to a horse’s ‘papers.’ They contain the essential data such as name, date of birth, and breeder. And for a purebred horse, the pedigree is added to that. It is precisely the various names in a pedigree that stand for different traits of the horse, as they can be understood as synonyms for a specific genetic makeup. Anyone who can read a pedigree—and unfortunately, very few can—knows a specific trait for every single name. And the crowning achievement is when you also know from experience how these names interact in certain combinations!
Just like buying a car, when buying a horse, you should know beforehand what you want and what you can afford. If I want a riding horse, I look in the pedigree for ancestors that were used as riding horses and perhaps even achieved success under saddle. If I want a racehorse, I look for Derby winners among the ancestors; if I want a show horse, then the prestigious names of champions in the pedigree are important. No one should expect a racehorse to win a show and vice versa, which is why—and because breeding has become so specialized—it is crucial to scrutinize the names in the pedigree and to find out which traits lie behind them.
And then there are those who claim that it is enough to judge the horse as it stands before you. Does it have riding horse conformation? Then you can ride it. Does it have ‘snort & blow’ and a lot of dish? Then it’s good for the show ring. Unfortunately, it isn’t quite that simple, because there are also internal traits. Thus, the work ethic, willingness to learn, rideability, and endurance only show when you actually put the horse under saddle! The probability—and genetics is always about probabilities—that these traits are anchored in a pedigree full of riding horses is, of course, greater than in a pedigree full of horses about which nothing of the sort has been recorded.
So, what is hidden in your horse’s pedigree? A Porsche or a Dacia? Research the individual horses in the pedigree yourself—admittedly, that is not so easy, but you will see that it is fun! And it is best to do this before buying a horse; after all, you don’t want to buy a Dacia if you intend to go car racing later on.
Gudrun Waiditschka
