Quote Originally Posted by Richard prior View Post
Extremely interesting conversation or topic, I’ll have to read it a few times so it sinks in, Hi Sturla, With so many breeding theory’s and choices these days, What are you thoughts on breeding back into the herd??
To avoid misunderstandings or confusion, what exactly is meant by this?

Quote Originally Posted by Richard prior View Post
Just going to comment on some of the above now, Some stallions do click with particular families, I think there’s more than enough evidence to prove that when you have a close look at Classic Families.
Maybe but what do you have in mind? The two hottest trotting stallions in Europe and NA, Muscle Hill and Ready Cash, have both displayed some extremely clear preferences in terms of damsires but not necessarily in terms of maternal families.

Muscle Hill have produced well with many kind of mares but none better than daughters of Cantab Hall and Credit Winner:

Southwind Frank (matfam Molly J)
Ariana G
All The Time (full sisters, matfam Minnehaha)
Manchego (matfam Topsey)

Resolve (matfam Midnight)
Bar Hopping (matfam Mambrino Beauty)
You Know You Do (matfam Lizzie Witherspoon)
Fly On (matfam Esther)

and if you look at maternal families as a whole, requiring a minimum of 20 foals to avoid those small groups where the career numbers of one horse makes the group averages representative, the maternal family that has clicked best with Muscle Hill is the Maggie H family (Marion Marauder, Lookslikeachpndale, Odds On Amethyst, Tobin Kronos etc).
This is not meant to be a comprehensive analysis but rather to illustrate that either damsire or maternal bloodlines are not the same as maternal families.

So "some stallions do click with particular families" - yes, if you mean certain damsires or certain bloodlines but no if you mean mares from specific maternal families if you ask me