>>> I would think *evaluation* of foals (numerical marks given based on the >>> system used for adult horses) would tend to reward precociously mature >>> and large foals, and carry the risk of trying to grow the foals up >>> artificially for evaluation time.
That brings up another point. It will take at least 2-3 months for certain en utero development schedules to equalize, and many of those are not genetic, but are simply the results of the particular pregnancy. In 2006, Landi was born on-or-just-before his due date, and was the smallest foal we have had born here - not fragile, but not a super-foal like well-past-due Hroi. This year, at not quite age 2, Landi is approaching 13.3H and is the biggest of the 2006 foals by a good margin. It took him months to catch up, and over a year to pass the growth rate of his siblings. Also, at birth, he had slack pasterns, a condition not at all uncommon in newborn foals. They tightened a lot in a day or two, but continued to tighten for at least a couple of weeks - I can't remember exactly how long now. In contrast, this year, Hroi was born with very upright pasterns - per everything I've read and from what the vet has told me, that was probably due to his position en utero, nothing genetic at all. Hroi's pasterns are pretty much normal now that he's about 5 weeks old, but the vet and the farrier have both told me that it can take up to 3 months for pastern conditions like these to equalize in some foals. How on earth could you judge a foal who hasn't gotten over the contortions he had to fold himself into the weeks before he was born? >>> still not ideal (IMO until the horse is an adult under saddle you don't >>> really know its quality), but at least it would give the owners >>> something to do. And that's probably the bottom line - the whole exercise is probably just to give the owners something to do. Karen Thomas, NC
