HGG Community Forums

Depending on why I’m breeding, I match papers and generations (eg 1st gen to 1st gen only, not crossing 1st and 2nd gens). For my performance/show breeders, I prefer to start with red/B “exceptionally perfect” foundations, because, like @ApollosLegacy said, you have a greater chance of blue/A foals the first go round.

For color breeding, like my liver and ND1 herds, I start with red/B if possible, but mainly end up beginning with yellow/C since it’s a more common thing to find. But I still do my best to match generation and paper level, to ensure more intact foals at the end of the day.

I will say, no matter the paper level, it took me a LONG time to get comfortable with pasture breeding, and I wish I’d started it a lot sooner. Not only does breeding in pastures give you better quality foals once the mares hit their “30 days in pasture” bonus, but breeding in pastures is significantly cheaper than hand breeding. You save about $1000 per foal, I think, Since one foal only “costs” 500hbs in pasture to produce. Then I sell the foals that didn’t pass to the auction bidder, and can make a good amount of hbs that way. If I’d started pasture breeding earlier on, I’d be a lot further along than I am today!

In my FeldingFields account: I only use foundation studs that are B. I try to use B mares, but like Apollo, there are some rank specials that work really well for the colors I'm looking for but aren't exper or expro. So I'll toss in some C mares if their color genetics are what I'm looking for, but they tend to be the first replaced.

In my MagesValley account: I breed for EE blacks and livers/black livers. My liver pasture has more Cs just do to the low odds of getting an exper or an expro that is liver. My stallion is still B papered (a custom GMT prize that replaced my former C papered stud). That results in slightly more spelds that when I was doing the C stud, but my intact foals tend to be higher papered. In the black pasture, I try to get expro and exper blacks, which are much more common (especially following blackout events). Any C papered mares that make it in to the pasture are the first ones replaced. But in general, because my color breeding requirements are much more specific, I have to compromise on paper a lot more.

On both accounts, when handbreeding or using straws, I try to match papers, but that's typically because my handbreeding is trying to get specific genes, and my goal is intact foals that can later be put in a pasture.

As a side note, @BellaVoce, mares will start getting pasture bonus after just a single day in the pasture, but the bonus hits its max at 30 days.

I actually have separate lines for both. I don't like to mix exceptional and regular foundations as they're essentially a generation apart in quality, so I have a regular foundation line and an exceptional foundation line which solves the problem for me.

I have primarily C/Yellow pairings at foundation level. I have a couple pastures of B/Red and i have one pasture of A/Red. I think as my C boys pass out of the game I will be switching to all B or A foundation studs (which means the joys of replacing all my mares lol)

I mix C/B studs with Yellow/ Red mares at foundation level. I also have an A papered foundation stud that i pair with Red mares.

Uneven breeding can mean 2 different things. It can mean uneven papers or uneven generations. I use both methods, depending on which line. Most people think of it as uneven generations, but you get better intact rates if you match paper level, regardless of generation.