February Foals

[Anonymous]

What are peoples opinions on February foals? here are some of the top 3 year olds world wide down the years that have been born in February;

Rip Van Winkle
Sariska
Mastercraftsman
Total Gallery
La Havre
Jukebox Jury
Mastery
Silver Frost
Fantasia
Natagora
New Approach
Ravens Pass
Kingsgate Native
Henrythenavigator
Fast Company
Alexandros
Confront
Ibn Khaldun
Authorized
Soldier of Fortune
Darjina
Eagle Mountain
Lucarno
Finsceal Beo
Sixities Icon
Marchand D’Or

Also some March fillies – Ghanaati, Zarkava, Midday, Goldikova

[Adrian]

I don’t really understand the question. Northern Hemisphere foals are born between January and June with those born in January and February having an advantage as 2yos which becomes less important as they get older.

Asking our opinions on February foals is basically asking for our opinion on about a quarter of the NH thoroughbred population.

[Anonymous]

Adrian,

I made this thread because I was just going through the top rated horses from the last few years looking for any trends which could be brought forward for next year.

Have you noticed any shifting paterns? alot of the top horses pre-2006 were foaled in March and now its more February

Breedings not my thing, maybe you could teach me a thing or too!?

cheers

[Sal]

alot of the top horses pre-2006 were foaled in March and now its more February

Way too much of vague statement really – only actual stats such as comparing the birthdates of the top twenty in the World Thoroughbred Rankings from each of the last twenty years might make it a valid statement.

Early foals will usually have a slight advantage over late foals until they reach full maturity, but I can’t really see much difference between February and March foals. The vast majority of flat-bred foals are born in those two months, so they are bound to throw up a big percentage of decent horses every year.

The only possible suggestion I would have is maybe that improvements in veterinary science means mares have more chance of getting in foal with the first covering, leading to more foals being born earlier in the year, but I don’t think it’s terribly likely that it would increase the numbers of February-born champions.

[Anonymous]

Great reply Sal, Thank you.

[Venusian]

It probably doesn’t make too much difference, if this article by Sue Montgomery in the Indy is anything to go by:

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/gene … 13751.html

Foals are unlikely to benefit much by spending the first month or so of their lives shivering in the cold.

I believe that Gold Cup winner Pas Seul was an August foal, not that that proves anything really.

[Prufrock]

This deals with foaling dates and early 2-y-os:

http://betting.betfair.com/horse-racing … 80309.html

[Adrian]

Thanks for the interesting link Prufrock.

Interesting that the Brocklesby winner, Hearts of Fire,
was born on 22nd April. However he obviously had far more ability than the normal Brocklesby winner and ended up winning his last 3 races including a Group 1 in Italy on his last start.

One thing to consider would be premature foaling dates and how they could skew data. These would be hard to analysis unless you had access to the Last Service Dates – which are published for mares in sales catalogues. However a foal which was born, say, in early January, may not be such an impressive selection if it has been born a couple of weeks premature and thus was possibly a sickly foal in those early times.

[Prufrock]

Thanks back at you, Adrian. I did not know that information was available anywhere.

The "premature foal" phenomenon was how I justified my (mistaken, at least in general) belief that early foaling dates were no significant advantage.

I have not gone through this year’s results in their entirety but managed to make a tidy profit by backing "qualifiers" (I have to admit to being slightly surprised that Sod’s Law had not booted in), though I might have got lucky as I only managed to follow events about half of the time.

[insomniac]

If it’s of any interest to breeding bods on here, one aspect of when a mare foals that may merit greater investigation is this:-
Are horses foaled by mares who were barren/uncovered the previous year better/stronger than those born to mares who had foaled the previous year?

This was an aspect that an American breeder posited some years ago. I don’t recollect his name or where I read his article, but he named a number of Internationally known top flat horses who were the products of mares who, for whatever reason, were not mothers the previous year.
His "explanation" was (and I paraphrase somewhat)that the mare was able to pass-on more life-enhancing gubbins to the foal in her womb if she hadn’t expended any of that gubbins with a pregnancy the year before. Rather like the old principle of leaving a field fallow every 3rd year or so.
Don’t know the stats for such a theory; don’t know the science. But the article was, nonetheless, a very good and rather convincing one.
Of course it’s impossible to come up with cast-iron conclusions from analysis of the mare as they will be covered by a variety of stallions, some who may be useless and others top-hole. It might be better to analyse the records of stallions. Does a stallions’ progeny out of mares who had a "fallow" previous season, perform better/race more often than those out of mares who had a foal the year before?
Does anyone know of any such study?

[Sal]

I think that’s an interesting idea, but of course there are many variables.

In favour: a mare who has had a ‘year off’ could well be healthier and stronger than one who has just had the strains of pregnancy, birth and suckling a foal. They can be covered earlier in the season and the covering is less likely to have stress or complications. This, plus not having to give any resources during early pregnancy to a suckling foal, may mean the mare can devote more energy and nutrition to the developing embryo, resulting in a stronger foal.

Against: if the mare was previously barren, or had needed to be rested, she may have underlying health problems. This may affect future pregnancies – the factor that caused her to be barren may affect the viability of the new foal. In addition, sometimes mares need plenty of practice to be good mothers. If she is not an experienced broodmare (due to missed years) she may get stressy and lose condition, which may affect the foal.

Out of interest, I’ve had a quick assessment of Galileo’s first crop – hardly a representative sample – but it’s getting late…

I divided the mares into 3 categories – maiden mares; mares with a living foal the previous year; mares with a non-productive return the previous year. Living foals was by far the biggest category. I then divided the progeny into 4 categories – unraced; non-winners; ordinary winners; black-type winners or placed.

Results:
Maidens.
Unraced = 29%
Non-winners = 25%
Winners = 21%
Black-type = 25% (an extraordinary 12.5% Group winners)

Previous year living foal.
Unraced = 18.5%
Non-winners = 25.5%
Winners = 34.5%
Black-type = 21.5% (5% Group winners)

Previous year non-productive.
Unraced = 14%
Non-winners = 14%
Winners = 64%
Black-type = 7% (O Group winners).

Make of that what you will – my brain hurts.

[insomniac]

Thanks Sal for, as usual, a thoughtful and intelligent post.

[Author]

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