Another breeding question

[gypsy's mom]

Everyone on the forum have been so helpful to me in the past, I hope you have the answers this time too.

So here goes: In your experience, can a mare in foal still show signs of heat and even stand for the stud? And will an experienced stud be interested? I'm trying to breed my little mare, bitty for the second year. Last year she never settled but I was taking her to the breeder. This spring I was fortunate enough to purchase the stud myself so now he is with her all the time. It seems as though she's still interested in him and will stand for him but only for a couple of days instead of a week like in the spring. What do you think?

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[Nathan Luszcz]

Hehe the short answer is: it depends

The range of mare behavior can very a lot, anywhere from just being overly interested in him and standing even when pregnant, to standing because she doesn't have enough progesterone and is in danger of loosing the foal. IN GENERAL I wouldn't worry about it too much, although if he does cover her there is a very good chance she'd abort. Stallion's semen is "injected" through their cervix and will cause the mare to loose any pregnancy she has.

As far as stallions, sometimes boys will be boys

and cover anything that will accept them. Other stallions are so selective we can't even use ovex tease mares, since they know the difference. How, I don't know, but some do. The range is so variable you won't really know until you know exactly how your stallion thinks, and if you are only breeding a few mares you may not know (just because you won't have that much chance to watch him). That's my two cents, for what its worth (about $0.015)

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[Relic]

Some mares stand for breeding once preg till the end and some stallions will do the deed till the end also. l only know that as thats what happen in March to my due mare who l watched in horror from my window back up to the stallions gate and l'm pretty sure did the job through the bars.. the second time she went over to him for more he just sniffed around her butt area but had no interest in the breeding part of it. She had a healthy stud colt later that night. There is another mare here who will do the same thing right from the beginning to the end if given the chance and out of 9 breeding stallions 2 of them will breed a preg mare the others show no interest aside from the usual yelling and prancing if a preg mom hangs her butt there way.

 

[yankee_minis]

I bought a "pasture bred" mare in late spring and she may have been due in early summer. NOT!

Well she went into heat as soon as she saw my stallion and since the vet had palpated her to be open, we bred them.

Now she has a bigger belly and we're thinking she may actually have a baby later this fall form the previous breeding. I should get the vet back out to palpate her because there is really no reason for her to have that belly...

So I would it to be true and maybe she will have a baby this year!

 

[HGFarm]

We had a full sized Appy mare that would accept a stallion even when she was obviously bred. What a hussy! So, I guess it depends on the mare..... I would have her checked to see if she was in foal if you want to know for sure.

 

[Joyce]

I once owned a mare that would stand for a stallion up to the day she delivered. I sold her to a girl in MA and I believe she is somewhere in NH now. In fact, she's the mare all grown up that is in my Avatar when she was 11 days old. I sure would like to know if she is still ok. Her name is Little Folks First Lady aka

Sweetie Pie when she lived with me.

Joyce L