600 to Bettors Delight - 'Absolute rubbish!'

[Peter McCarthy]

http://www.harnesslink.com/www/Article.cgi?ID=84681

I just cannot believe this story on harnesslink tonight that Bettors Delight could breed 600 mares this year and that he has already bred huge numbers in previous years. That is crazy and will make the foals worth nothing at the sales. Why is this allowed and what can be done about this stupid number of mares getting bred to one stallion?

[Neil]

they have to find a way to control that - not just for the value of the foals but what about breeding from future generations of fillies

[Southern Man]

The market will make the correction just as it did with Christian Cullen. If they already have 400 odd booked, history would say they will serve closer to 800 than 600. Woodlands have been around long enough to know that nothing kills a stallions value quicker than books of mares like this.

[Backward Step]

Cheap bettors delights at the sale - fantastic!

[Neil]

so what do the breeders think of that

[Thomas Johnson]

The latest from inside the Blue Chip Farm camp is they have already got over 600 down under and will breed more!

[mango]

Hi Thomas

Bettor's had a great year down here in he's first season but so he should he served 540 mare's. He had a 3yr old filly go 1:54.4 yesty at Ashburton and it seems both fillies and colts can run not like some stallions only throwing to the one. From your point of view what do you think about a stallion down here serving possibly 600 mare's or do you think we should be like the U.S and say limit a stallions book to say around 200.

[Termite]

What a super first season this sire had. However, commercial breeders will run for the hills if they are accepting books in the order of 4-500

[triplev123]

Hmmmm. Never let some baseless emotives stand in the way of the cold, hard facts troops.

After dominating the Australian 2yo Sires list last season with a debut crop of just 117 live foals (Art Major had 113), the fact is that Bettor's Delight has produced just 80 live foals each for the subsequent 2 seasons (while in the same period Art Major has produced 221 and 181).

So tell me then Mango, with Bettor's Delight having a further 160 foals to come on line in the next two seasons and Art Major having 402, which of these two sires is more likely to flood the Australian Yearling Sale market in the coming years? :confused:

[mango]

Hi Triplev123
How are you going and thanks for your input, just wondering where i said that Bettor's or any stallion is going to flood the Aussie market. What i asked was should studs put a limit on there books like Hanover Shoe Farms and other studs. And the 2nd season at stud Bettor's served 270 and then 449 and them same years Art Major 376 and 374 and last year Grinfromeartoear around 420 in Australasia. And if you read my post you might actually understand that i like Bettor's so it's in no way only mean't for him. And Art Major is to only serve 150 in Australia this year plus returns as a letter i recieved from Alabar stud and i'm not sure how many he will serve in N.Z. so it will be interesting to see if they stick to it. Alot of people i've spoken to reckon it would be a great idea to cap the numbers and i think it will happen in the not to distant future.

[triplev123]

As Australian Defamation Law is to the truth of many matters being publically revealed...so officially imposed Book Limits would be to the continued improvement of the Standardbred Breed in the Southern Hemisphere. In a word, stifling.
The financial constraints imposed on studs/stallion owners by restricted books would at the very least greatly curtail and in all likelyhood bring to an abrupt halt the current shuttle sire business & we would run the grave risk of a return to the bad, bad, bad old days of genetic trash and race track never were's.
Not to worry though. As the great Muhammad Ali once said to Howard Cosell "It ain't gonna happen. All you can do is wonder and imagine". I can't speak for NZ...but here in Australia the mere mention of our Restriction Of Trade Laws would serve to knock down any such move in a heartbeat.

[mango]

So throw the law out for a second, do you agree with stallions serving 500+ mare's per season or to be realistic should the mark of 300 max be agreed on. I do understand that it costs alot of money to purchase rights, insurance and travel for a stallion but surely a stud doesn't think wow we must get 500 mare's a year or we will go broke because if that was the case they wouldn't take the risk. So common sense prevails and a stud should budget on 100 mare's to cover costs at the most and then when serving 300 there making good money. I mean 100 mare's to bettor's is a touch over $1 million so if he gets 300 mare's that $3 million. This also makes the stallion commercial enough to breed and sell. I don't think it will halt the shuttle stallions at all because i don't think studs go in signing contracts and walking away thinking we need 500 mare's per year to be profitable.

[Termite]

Once again, we seem to be in howling agreement Mango. There is no doubt that the economics of shuttling stallions have altered in the last 10 years. With Australian breeders now paying $8-12 thousand to get to the top commercial stallions the prospect of shuttling from the states is super attractive - particularly with an aussie dollar which has largely prevailed above 80 us cents for past 5years and as we are well aware has recently danced around parity. In fact stallions like Bettors, Art Major, Jeremes Jet, etc would probably deliver a similar return to owners serving 200 Down Under mares, as they do serving their 160 book in the US.

Another factor which has altered the game is the ever shortening commercial life span of stallions. With breeders shunning even the most well-credentialed stallion for 1 bad crop, stallion owners in the states are well aware that they must 'make hay while the sun shines'. This often means shuttling reduces the risk of expensive stallon purchases and syndications.

Finally, the laws of supply and demand would dictate that not only will limited books enable stallion owners to command a premium price for the upper echelon of stallions, but the profitability of 2nd and 3rd tier stallions would grow, as mare owners look for options outside the full books of the top stallions. In Australia we are often seeing really good siring prospects shuttle over and serve 60-90 mares.

Anyway, good topic and interesting to hear the thoughts of others.

[triplev123]

You know something Troops?
It never ceases to amaze me how people with apparently no real understanding of nor any direct financial stake in the stallion business will nevertheless freely suggest to all those who do have their hard earned squarely in the ringer on a year in year out basis, how they can/should go about recouping their stallion investment/s. A Stud should budget on this, a Stud should do that. To be realistic...etc etc etc. Fair dinkum. Are you listening to yourselves? Do you have any concept of how hard it actually is to first find the right horse and then how hard it is to get into that horse?. Do you know how many potential pitfalls there are at every step of the way? Is it really any wonder to anyone that any Southern Hemisphere Stud who , for all intents & purposes, manages to pull a Rabbit out of a Hat by way of pin hooking a top sire, then embarks on a course of making Hay while the sun shines? If they instead picked a Dog I can tell you that nobody comes around St. Vincent de Paul style in 5 or 6 years time and books in 200 mares just so the Stud and the Shareholders can get their money back.
In response to your opening question Mango, I very passionately agree with the best stallions that are available in this part of the world getting every opportunity and I support them and their owners being free to serve as many mares as they are physically able to. I am equally as passionate about the rest of the dross serving as few mares as possible and if it were up to me, preferably none at all. In this particular marketplace I can see absolutely no reason whatsoever in an arbitrary figure imposition, be it 140, 300 or whatever. This goes directly to my next point...

You're also both making the HUGE mistake of taking the economics of State-side based syndicated stallions who's various owners are invariably involved specifically because they all have their own commercial broodmare bands to take care of and because they breed to sell the resultant yearlings at the sales...and you're trying to super-impose these US/CAN marketplace specific aspects over the largely breed to race culture that dominates the Southern Hemisphere. Up there the stud farms sell Yearlings. Down here the stud farms sell Semen. It is no more nor less complicated than that.
Add to this the fact that the only figure that matters to any degree in the equation is NOT mares served but rather the outcome of those services, as in is how many live foals are produced per crop in any given country. Back we go to the thread title honouree & original example and so then to a few facts that shoot so many holes in the basic premise of this restrict the books argument that it will look like a Cheese Grater. Here in Australia Bettor's Delight has produced just 80 live foals a season for the past two seasons. He has 80 current 2yos that will head off to the track from around Dec. 2010 onwards and he has a further 80 current yearlings, some of which will make appearances at Australian Yearling Sales in early 2011.

The rule of thumb here in Australia has always been a roughly 70/30 split that's in favour of the breed to race crew. It's so predictable that you can annually & reasonably accurately work out approximately how many yearlings are going to turn up at the Sales by the bigger name sires in the following year by applying this 70/30 split to the resultant live foal numbers of their annual foal crops. In this instance it suggests that the 9 yearling sales held at 8 different sales venues across the country will host somewhere in the general vicinity of 24 Bettor's Delight sired yearlings in early 2011. Now given his excellent results here last season, it is most certainly possible that there might even be a few more of them turn up than usual. Maybe he might even get as many as 30 to 35 out of a total of 80 foals Australia wide...but he will not be represented by numbers that come even close to supporting the whole 'sky is falling' come 'market crushing' assessment that the more ill-informed commentators have seen fit to repeatedly expound. :confused:

In closing, I'm now left to wonder :confused: where all the Alarmists were when the likes of Live Or Die, Armbro Operative, Fake Left, Falcon Seelster, Holmes Hanover and so on were merrily covering MASSIVE books of mares on their home turf and sometimes on both sides of the Tasman. I ask you, where was all the wringing of hands, the tugging of forelocks and the gnashing of teeth when that was all on the boil? As a verse of that crappy old song by Simon and Garfunkel went...
And in the naked light I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more
People talking without speaking
People hearing without listening
People writing songs that voices never share
And no one dared
Disturb the sound of silence

Incidentally, if my memory serves me correctly, the whole big numbers covered thing all started up with old Vance Hanover, the horse who's Southern Hemisphere siring success shocked Vernon Dancer so much because "He was so slow he could not pace in 2:10 on the best day of his life". Ain't it just grand? :-P

[mango]

Its a forum where you discuss topics and get people's insight of there idea's. Your reply would of been good without trying to be a smart ass and to say we have no understanding is wrong. Go back and read my post as i do understand all costs involved but you can't tell me they need 400+ mare's a year to make it viable. And to say that the rest of the dross should serve less mare's or none at all is also wrong, people can't afford to spend big money on service's all the time so we do need them stallions and if studs stop bringing them stallions out here there will be half the mare's bred to each year which in turn will effect field size's and turnover down the track. And just out of interest sake would your name be the one and only J.V ?

[triplev123]

I'll ask you the simple questions - Would you allow the various Southern Hemisphere studs to tell you what to do with your mares, yearlings etc? If the answer is no then why do you and others grant yourself a say in their business model?

[justdoit]

triplev123
The problem is not just the stallions being able to breed open books of mares. It is that a lot of mare owners have unrealistic values of their broodmares, the offspring. I´m sure you have
seen many sales catalogues and it is not that hard to put prices on most lots prior to a sale.
Here is $5000 dollars for you, now tell me the truth about my mare. More than likely I would go and breed her some where that had more smoke & mirrors.

[triplev123]

G'day Justdoit,

EXACTLY. I've certainly been guilty of doing that over the years (as in breeding a mare to a top end sire that she really did not deserve to be bred to). There would be very few if any Breeders out there who have not done so at one time or another & sometimes even repeatedly so. Heart rules Head stuff. Yours is a point very well made. You think you're 'doing the right thing by the mare'... but what you're doing is essentially the same as someone over-capitalising on piece of Real Estate. Could not agree more. I think we may have been twins, seperated at Birth. :p

The aspects of the restrict stallion books argument that I still can't get my head around is that by capping books fees for many of the heavy hitters both current and future will go up, absolutely no question at all.
At the same time the proponents of capping books are bemoaning the fact that fees are already too high...quote ' people can't afford to spend big money on service's all the time' end quote.

If that's not an example 'Wayne Swan Economics Theory' then I'll eat my grotty old Lawn Mowing Shoes. :confused: :confused: :confused: :confused: :confused: :confused: :confused:

[mango]

Triplev123
Fair assesment and your right my answer would be no. But in know way does that change me thinking that there should be a max number of mare's served by a stallion. This would allow the smaller studs with the dross as you would call to get a few extra mare's to there stallions, as mare's would have to be spread out a bit more. It's these stallions that produce mainly bread and butter horses and these horses are what the industry rely's on to make up fields and to race at our country tracks and if lucky enough might get a start in the city.

Justdoit
I fully agree with you there are a great deal of people with know idea about breeding, you will see yearlings at sale's with 5 dams on the page, very little black print but have spent $10,000 on a service and they wonder why there yearling doesnt make service fee.

[triplev123]

1. You'd think that would be the case Mango, it's a fair and reasonable view, but it is not.

I was privy to the results of an independent study of the Australian racing product from not so long ago that was specifically aimed at discovering whether or not 2yo racing had any long term negative effects on the overall available to race horse numbers.

Two of the most notable findings were that...

a) it did not have any negative effect to their long term career prospects and

b) although we were certainly breeding fewer horses than in years past those that were produced were taking up the slack in admirable fashion, getting to the races in far greater numbers than their predecessors and not only that but they were having more starts per horse per season & also having more race starts lifetime.

Now b) was for all intents and purposes actually a spin-off finding of the study, initially they weren't looking for/expecting it....but that finding says at least two things to me, it underlines them in thick black marker pen in fact.

1- A Breeding focus on juvenile performance, something that so many have bemoaned, has in fact had absolutely no deleterious effects whatsoever on the available to race horse population in this country.

and more applicably to the general thrust of this particular thread...

2- Increasingly better quality sires have correspondingly produced increasingly better quality offspring, horses that go earlier, that not only race for longer but also more often and horses that are clearly much sounder despite them being multiple times faster than their forebears.


The second point doesn't come about that quickly, if at all, by way of top sires serving restricted books and seeing the overflow go to a series of lesser lights all down the line.

For example, it is no accident that in the space of just 5 years in order to win the NSW Breeders Challenge a 2yo now has to be able to go in least 1:55 & a piece/1.56.0. Not so long ago the 2yo NSW SS Finals were nothing short of embarrassing, being run and won in 2:03-2:04 and a piece. Aaaaargh. The bad old days. :-(

[mango]

Triplev123
Very interesting and well done, if this had of been published before maybe myself and others might of had a different view. For horses to race longer and that are much more sounder it's good for everyone. And you are right you do have to go 55/56 but in saying that it wasn't possible to do at Harold Park. The only thing i worry about is the little studs are struggling and in years to come there won't be no little studs with the cheaper stallions for the people who struggle in the industry.

[triplev123]

The problem is that many of those same small Studs with cheap/poor quality sires are the ones who are greatly assisting in perpetuating that struggle by way of knocking out a lousy product that can't win without some form of protectionist umbrella. The now defunct NSW Sires Stakes is a classic example of what can happen to the breed when 3rd, 4th & 5th tier sires are artificially made financially viable propositions.
Cheap does not always = poor quality though. I can think of at least 4 sires, all excellent racehorses, 1 proven and 3 unproven, that you can get into for less than $4,000 so it's not all doom and gloom by any means.

[Flashing Red]

Studs don't need unlimited books to recoup their money - they already do it on ridiculous things like charging $30 for a monthly worming which (a) they wouldn't do monthly and (b) costs only $12 anyway!! I don't buy into the "poor studs" argument - I've seen their bills I'd say they would do pretty well!!

[Flashing Red]

t here in Australia the mere mention of our Restriction Of Trade Laws would serve to knock down any such move in a heartbeat.

You would have to get someone to challenge it first. The unit co-ordinator (and former consistutional lawyer) for the consitutional law unit in one of Qld's main universities stated during that terrible period with EI that restricting the movement of horses between states would have (most likely) been sucessfully challenged in court. I can understand no trotting folk challenging it but some of those thoroughbred folk have more money than you can poke a stick at and sat tight and did nothing in a industry that has a lot more perks and money than ours... it isn't black white. :)

I for one hope they get some sort of cap. Maybe not as small as America - but 400, 500, 600 foals? Com'on. Doesn't it make you just a little queasy?? And this isn't directed to any stallion specifically. Just in general.

I stand to be corrected, but do not thoroughbred have a limit of 120 mare per season in the southern hemisphere. Obviously they are also limited by natural service, but still.

[justdoit]

Interesting read from 1991

Stallion "Closed Books"

Is the industry through its Studmasters and Stud Owners able to continue a policy of regulated stallion limits? The answer is simply that it cannot be sustained. The Australian Trade Practices legislation will ensure that it will be unable to retain these limitations upon challenge. When the more commercial large scale operations either break ranks or decide on economic return on investment criteria to challenge the regulations this will go. It is my belief that only "voluntary" codes of practice will survive.

Rod Pollock
Chief Executive &
Keeper of the Stud Book


The stallion sets the limit in the thoroughbreds, the same as in the standardbreds:)
i agree that a limit should be set. A stallion with huge .....semen production, 600 could not be that big of a deal.

[Flashing Red]

Interesting read from 1991

Stallion "Closed Books"

Is the industry through its Studmasters and Stud Owners able to continue a policy of regulated stallion limits? The answer is simply that it cannot be sustained. The Australian Trade Practices legislation will ensure that it will be unable to retain these limitations upon challenge. When the more commercial large scale operations either break ranks or decide on economic return on investment criteria to challenge the regulations this will go. It is my belief that only "voluntary" codes of practice will survive.

Rod Pollock
Chief Executive &
Keeper of the Stud Book


The stallion sets the limit in the thoroughbreds, the same as in the standardbreds:)
i agree that a limit should be set. A stallion with huge .....semen production, 600 could not be that big of a deal.

Key word here is that it must be challenged - if it isn't, and as I have already previously iterated (sp?) there was another perfect opportunity for a challenge with EI where there was much higher stakes and nothing was done - so studs can set whatever limits they choose. If only it could be 150. lol.

[triplev123]

Notably...that was one of the very few things RP ever said that made any sense. :-P

[buster]

if they restrict the books then who will end up with the 100 bookings? take a guess it wont be the small studs and other battlers that everyone is trying to stick up for - business is never going to be 'fair' its up to the individual to strive to do better

its like the apg premium sale, all they've done is given an advantage to the high end of the market and left the bottom out t0 dry, as evidenced by the terrible 3 day sale in Melbourne last year, as if the larger clients of apg dont get preferential treatment or the people who work for apg that also breed

it doesnt matter in the long run what we do down here as we are just following the hype from the US breeding scene and every now and again a battler from over there will become a good stallion here

[justdoit]

Hi Buster,
Can someone else explain to Buster what has been happening in the AU and NZ breeding industry lately.

[buster]

mmmm i dunno but the horses are going 5 seconds faster and sitting 3 wide without cover and winning..so something right is happening

but hey maybe we should forsake all this progress and go back to breeding with globe derby horses


** but im assuming you mean in following the US, well seeing as we pay 6k for sportswriter - unproven and never raced here, rocknroll hanover 20k only just having horses racing now, still unproven, american ideal yet to be proven a good stallion here, plus the hundred other failures that no one remembers

and yet courage under fire, elsu, auckland reactor etc all proven stars in aus are standing for the same and less then these stallions

i bet mr feelgood doesnt get the book of mares he would have got if he was as dominant in the US as he is here

[justdoit]

Hi Buster you wrote

it doesnt matter in the long run what we do down here as we are just following the hype from the US breeding scene and every now and again a battler from over there will become a good stallion here

I totally disagree with you Buster, possibly you are thinking of what has happened in the past.

As for Mr Feelgood he will breed 2 to 3 times as many mares as he would have if he had raced on in the US,
If his management and fertilitly give him no problems.

[Flashing Red]

and yet courage under fire, elsu, auckland reactor etc all proven stars in aus are standing for the same and less then these stallions

With all due respect to their connections, and in my humble, humble, opinion, but those 3 horses you mentioned would not have been up to the calibre of either the top US 3yos or Grand Circuit aged horses. THAT, IMHO, is why people go to your Rocknrolls, Art Majors, etc. They simply, IMHO, are a "better" (ability wise) horse. And that is no shame. As you have identifed, our breed has improved in leaps and bounds in the past 5-10 years. Seconds difference. Why? IMHO we FINALLY have access to the BEST stallions in the world. We didn't 5-10 years ago. Now picking mates for your mares is so hard because we have SO many fantastic stallions available! :) Not North America's rejects or stallions that were successful back in the day in North America but came to us in the twilight of their stud career (due to age). The gap is closing IMHO between down under and North American horses. But IMHO, we are not there yet. Their horses are still better.

[triplev123]

I agree Flashing. The improvements in overall quality have been incredible in recent times. A foal/weanling/yearling that we'd have been happy enough with 10 years ago would more than likely be bottom of the pecking order today. With that increase in sire quality of course comes a rise in expectations & I'm very, very pleased to say that so far, so good. I really like what I see in both our yearlings & the current season foals. We've got 1 in particular, a filly & currently a foal...and I've got to say, she has me more excited about the future than anything that we've ever bred. You see a lot of horses pass by as we all do but every so often you see one that makes your heart jump. This is one of them. I'll try and get a pic and send it along so you can see what I'm crapping on about. What a ripper. Here's a likeness of my face when looking at her in the paddock. :D

[triplev123]

Incidentally, harking right back to the title of this thread, I sincerely hope that when the final figures for Oz and NZ come out...the person who came up with that sensationalist headline is big enough to seek similar levels of attention to their apology for having gotten it all so very, very wrong.
Attempting to fill the general information vacuum that continues to exist in the Southern Hemisphere with regard to such matters is one thing however not having had anything even remotely approaching concrete on hand and nevertheless choosing to fill said vacuum...with bullshit...is another thing entirely. A job at NZHRW no doubt beckons the author. Perhaps a nice info-mercial on Love You to kick off ? Just a thought.

[justdoit]

Hi Triplev123,
Is love You a porn channel?:)

[triplev123]

Dunno. Have called Foxtel and am awaiting their reply. :rolleyes:

[mango]

When you find out let me know i might subscibe lol.

[triplev123]

https://jspivey.wikispaces.com/file/view/guillotine.gif/99995181/guillotine.gif

5:45pm NZ time. Non-TAB event at Addington.

The question upon all the keen observers lips is..."Will D'Arcy de Gerolstein meet 'The Democratic Machine' of Monsieur Guillotine?"

Stay tuned. :p

[buster]

just watched the apg videos, apparently art major is the top juvenile sire while bettors is the leading juvenile sire

didnt realise there could be 2 top stallions

[mango]

I think Art Major might of been the top juvenile sire last year, Bettor's only had 2yr olds on the ground and he topped that list. They also could mean that so far into this season that Bettor's is the leading juvenile sire.

[triplev123]

The damline patter is usually a snap but it must be very hard for them to come up with a different angle to the sire blurb.
Nevertheless...I thought that VIC's own DASHING DAN MILECKI did an excellent job of the voice overs.
If only a couple of the people who were leading the yearlings could have taken a leaf from Dan's book and made a similar stirling effort...but at their attire...it would have all presented even better again. One bloke looks to me like he's been a regular at the Matthew Talbot Hostel's soup kitchen and stepped in for the day to earn a few bucks on the side schlepping a horse or two around for the cameras. I know it's the horse we're supposed to be looking at but fair dinkum.
I admit that I'm probably super sensitive to it all because I can vividly remember Owners accepting various NSWSS Heat Trophies whilst wearing blue Shearer's singlets, tracksuit pants and thongs...whilst uttering those immortal words "We've got an even better one at 'ome in the paddock". But, I disgress. :p