Breeding and Foaling (Best Time)

[Tynedale]

What do you think works best for you re covering times and foaling times and why?
Cover early, for example 1st May, to have an early April foal the following year, bearing in mind they will need to be in at nights for a while but can be weaned at 6 months later Oct when weather still okay.
Cover later say June/July, to foal May/June so can probably stay out at night after a short while but weaned Nov/Dec when weather probably grim anyway?
The weather this year has made me think about this, we have 2 young foals and since they arrived all it has done is RAIN.
We have managed to turn them out twice a day to have a run around but only for short periods in the sand school.
Then of course you have the other part of it, what if the mares don't take first time.
Just trying to think about when to start covering this year.
Any views at all welcome.

[DalesLady]

I always aimed for early May foals, but not always ucky covering first time, so have had foals June and July before now. However, I then made up my mind to wean the foals later than normal as you cannot do much with them at the end of the year anyway, and the mares were not in foal again anyway. We have been lucky with this that the winters I made that choice were kind enough to leave the mares outside and weaning took place as the foals were 8 months old. The plus side was that weaning was very easy because the foals were quite independent and the mares ready mentally. The last winter though I would have been stuck... I think I would still aim for late April/early May foals if I were to do it again.

[cassey1988]

I would wean them later. Chances are that the foal will be naturally weaned by then, and that does decrease the stress which is always good.

[cadeby]

Spring tends to arrive a month earlier for us here in France so covering in April for March foals is feasible weather-wise, although we generally prefer to wait until May to start covering. We tend to start with the maiden mares and any known difficult breeders first, just so that there is more time to overcome any difficulties. However, this year, Fiona has already been to King as I would ideally like her to be "done and dusted" so that we can concentrate on Inca and Belle who are new to us and are therefore unknown entities in terms of ease of breeding.

The majority of our foals have been born in April and May which works best for us because (i) we like to wean at 6 months or later and (ii) we like to keep the weanlings with us for training for about a month, before they leave for their new homes.
This means most of our foals leave in late November/early December, so are settled in their new homes before their owners get too busy with Christmas, or we keep them over Christmas and they leave in January.

We always stable our newborn foals at night for at least 2 weeks (so that they get used to the yard routine and early handling), so bringing them in at night is normal for us, regardless of the weather or time of year they are born. Even if they were born in the height of Summer, they would still come in at night initially.

Personally, I wouldn't want a foal born any late than July as our grass often burns-off in the summer heat and the milk quality would be reduced. That being said, our mare Gem did not read the Rule Book She jumped out of her paddock and visited Wilf for an unplanned liason in October. Talisman was born the following September, fortunately just in time for the second flush of grass.

[valerie n scout]

when I bought Acorn my first Dales many, many, moons ago now...I tried to show him and was unsuccessful as he was born late, so was quite a way behind the other youngsters. I became down hearted and stopped showing him as we were nearly always last

[DalesLady]

I can understand that Valerie, they must be at a disadvantage as youngsters - but they do catch up in the end