HGG Community Forums

I am continuing to streamline my breeding stock, but I'm also changing up some of my goals. I really want my lines to be homozygous for whatever gene(s) that I'm aiming for by G3-G4, so anything above gen 4 that doesn't have most or all of the genes I'm breeding for will be donated to the show barns (or sold). My quality requirements remain the same in terms of papering, but I'm cracking down on PT scores in my mares and stallions. I've been around for a few real life years and my herd barely makes it into the 12.2+ region (I don't bootstrap, so my showherd is at a slight disadvantage there).

Take this gal for example:

BV3 8529676
If her own babies don't inherit her sooty+, pangere+, DP, and W3, I may snip them. I don't snip her because her ma and da don't each have all the genes, so there was no way for her to be hom for everything--but the next generation. The scissors will come.

I can feel myself coming up on a herd reorganization too, especially with my higher generations. I can't decide whether it would be more rewarding to a) continue to benchmark breed and get the highest possible quality I can at each generation or b) just start bootstrapping for some extra show ponies and refocus my efforts on my lower gens.

In my lower gens, I'm finding some new color combos I really enjoy, but the challenge will be separating the fantasy genes because I would really like to get on the new DFP breeder's club boards! Bootstrapping my higher gens would definitely give me more picture space to separate my fantasy horses from the non-fantasy.

And then I remind myself that I'm a grad student coming up on midterms and this reorganization is not a project I need to take on now! But I guess that gives me more time to strategize the transition.