stallion | Horse Racing Free Tips

Breaking Lucky Represented by First Foal

GSW & MGISP Breaking Lucky (Lookin at Lucky–Shooting Party, Sky Classic) was represented by his first foal Jan. 29, a colt born at Blue Star Racing in Louisiana. Bred by 4M Ranch and Blue Star Racing, the colt is out of Anea (Unbridled's Song).

“If there is one word that I can use to describe this colt, it would be strong,” said Blue Star Racing Owner Dex Comardelle. “He is nicely put together, has all the right angles, has good bone, conformation, and lots of leg! If this first colt is any indication of how the rest of Breaking Lucky's crop will look, it's going to be an exciting year.”

A four-time winner and millionaire, Breaking Lucky stands at Pleasant Acres Stallions in Florida for $5,000 LFSN.

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First Reported Foal by Om at Harris Farm

The first reported foal by multiple graded winner Om (Munnings–Rare Cat, by Tabasco Cat) was born Jan. 18 at Harris Farms in Coalinga, California. Bred by Al and Saundra Kirkwood, the chestnut filly is the third foal from the Unusual Heat allowance winner All the Heat, who is a full sister to Inflamed, dam of Grade I winner Mo Forza.

Om, who broke his maiden in his second start at two defeating subsequent Triple Crown winner American Pharoah, continued to excel at three through his 7-year-old seasons, winning four graded races including the GII Del Mar Derby, GII Twilight Derby and GII Mathis Brothers Mile, in addition to on-the-board finishes in 13 other graded stakes, including two editions of the GI Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint.

Om, who also set a new course record at Churchill Downs for 5 1/2 furlongs, retired with earnings of $1,355,082. Property of the Sareen Family Trust and Harris Farms, the 9-year-old will stand his second season at Harris Farms for $6,000 payable when the foal stands and nurses.

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Like Humans, Dominant Horses Usually Found In Group’s Center

It's been recognized for decades that wild horse herds have a distinct hierarchy, typically with one dominant stallion that fathers all the offspring and one dominant mare that leads the herd to grazing ground. However, new research shows that there is actually a multilevel social structure to feral herds.

Drs. Tamao Maeda, Sakiho Ochi, Monamie Ringhofer, Sebastian Sosa, Cédric Sueur, Satoshi Hirata and Shinya Yamamoto used a drone to study 200 feral horses that lived in Serra D'Arga, Portugal. The study team took aerial images of the horses at 30-minute interval from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. for 30 days. They were able to identify more than 100 of the horses from the air using ground observation to determined color, markings and body shape.

The team then studied the patterns of interactions between the horses in the images to better understand their social structure. They concluded that there are multiple smaller social “units” within the larger herd. Each unit is comprised of two types of social groups: a harem of one or two adult males and several females and immature individuals; or an all-male unit of bachelors that could not attract any females.

The team discovered that these units all operate together to form a herd. In the herd the team studied, large mixed-sex units were typically at the center of the group of horses, with smaller mixed-sex and all-male units on the periphery. Their findings are consistent with the hierarchical strata of other social animals in which the more-dominant animals often occupy the center of the group, pushing subordinates to the periphery.

Read the full report here.

Why Do Some Geldings Act Like Stallions?

Some male horses, even when gelded, can act like intact stallions. These behaviors can cause issues when the horses are turned out or when they are being handled in the barn.

As most stallions are kept only for breeding purposes, the majority of horse owners have no experience with them or their hormone-driven behaviors; eliminating these behaviors is a driving force behind having a male horse castrated.

Gelding a horse removes his testes, eliminating the source of testosterone, but some of the greatest effects of testosterone occur when the horse in utero, where the fetus' testes pump out a plethora of male hormones. This early influence may cause geldings to act like stallions, fighting with other geldings, mounting mares, acting aggressively with people, attacking foals or herding mares.

Interestingly, many geldings that exhibit stallion-like behavior are in their teens, though it's unclear why they act this way more than their younger counterparts. One theory is that a tumor on the geldings' pituitary glands secrete extra hormones. Another theory suggests that the increased confidence and social rank that comes with age may encourage the stallion-like behavior.

Some geldings may act stud-like because they were not gelded completely; they may have a retained testicle that has failed to drop into the scrotum. A blood test can determine if the horse has a retained testicle, which can be removed surgically.

Stallion-like behaviors can include:

Fecal marking. Some geldings will pass manure on other horse's fecal piles as a way of making others aware of his presence. Stallions in the wild do this as well.
Flehmen response. A horse raises his head, curls his upper lip and inhales to better smell mares he is near. This is a harmless action, but can accompany more troublesome actions.
Mounting mares. This can be a dangerous as mounting can injure the mare or the gelding if he is the recipient of a kick.
Fighting. A gelding acting stallion-like may fight off male horses to keep them away from “his” mares, potentially injuring himself or other horses in the process.
Herding or guarding mares. A gelding may continuously move mares away from people or other horses in the field, keeping them just out of reach.
Acting aggressively with people. Anyone working with or near a gelding exhibiting this behavior will be at risk of being bitten, charged or struck, especially if mares are present.