Kirkcarrion Highland Ponies

Surely not, you may be thinking! There are plenty of Highlands around, they're increasingly popular across the UK and being exported all over the world to set up or replenish breeding stocks overseas. They won the M&M Championships at Olympia the past two years and are to be seen in riding schools, trekking centres, family and competition homes doing everything from jumping and dressage to driving, endurance and RDA work.

And yet in late 2001 the Rare Breeds Survival Trust decided to place the Highland Pony on Category 3 of its Rare Breeds list. Why? Simply because there have been fewer foals registered in the past few years and only 2-300 last year in total. As many of these will go on to be geldings or not used for breeding, it is probably true to say that the breed falls within the RBST criteria of having less than 1000 breeding females. A problem with limited breeding populations is that the gene pool becomes small and in some cases this is exacerbated because of the licenced stallions around, only a few stand at public stud and thus produce the majority of the foals registered. Where there are just a few bloodlines which are most commonly used for breeding it is important to encourage small studs who perhaps don't stand their own stallion but send mares to a variety of studs over a few years - they can diversify the lines significantly. Other small studs may own a stallion and breed him to their own 2-3 mares but not stand him at public stud - it is a hassle that not everyone wants or has time to manage properly. Visiting mares can, frankly, be a pain because there is greater pressure when it is not your own mare, increased risks of damage to the stallion or other mares because of strange ponies coming and going, and the health risk of infectious diseases being brought in unknowingly.

The ending of the Stallion Premium scheme in 2000, due to loss of financial backing, meant that there was less opportunity for small scale breeders to see available stallions or bring their own out for inspection and publicity prior to standing them at stud. So while a number of small breeders have stallions they use privately to produce a foal or two each year, the majority of foals are coming from a fairly limited gene pool and particular stallion lines.

As yet there is still sufficient diversity in Scotland but overseas populations of Highland ponies have particular problems and even in parts of the UK there may only be one local licenced Highland stallion available to visiting mares. To help alleviate some of these problems the HPS agreed at its AGM in 2001 to permit registration of purebred foals conceived by artificial insemination (AI) within certain defined restrictions. This should help the overseas breeders in particular as the cost of exporting a new stallion can be exorbitant and will of course only be a temporary solution until he starts coming into his own stock too!

A key benefit of the RBST listing of the breed is that there are a number of schemes which can be developed to inform and support the small scale breeder in their attempts to produce good quality foals that will uphold the very best of the breed. What form this assistance will take is not yet clear, but I for one welcome the move and look forward to seeing what the outcome is. As a small scale breeder myself I am highly aware of the difficulties in selecting the right stallion for a particular mare, to build on her strengths and counter her weaknesses, taking into account bloodlines, temperament, performance and just that basic gut instinct as to whether they will click or not. Breeding is a big gamble at the best of times as you have no guarantee that the result won't be a foal with the worst of each parent, so any covering really has to be done with a very clear mind! When things do work out as hoped, though, it is all worth while and there is no feeling like watching your homebred foals playing around their dams in the field.

See also a fascinating article produced by Joan Alexander in March 2002 on Highland breeding patterns

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Copyright ©A Douglas 1997 Last Modified: 09:24:36 Fri, 26 Apr 2002