Tawna &
“Severn El Shaddai” 1992
Of course, around this same time, I saw my first “colored warmblood”…. to be continued.
DQS History
Written by: T. House
I am a hind end breeder, therefore, I feel this approach is a lost art in this day and age of breeding.
Most dressage riders and breeders desire front end movers. They do not understand mechanics, the need for a stronger hind-end, and most do not understand how to identify a properly moving FEI prospect.
This is the story of my life’s work:
When I was just a teen, I scoured videos of dressage horses. Mind you, I was very young, clueless, and wanted to be “breeder of dressage horses”.
I also had a love for Arabians.
Within my research, I found that I was drawn to lines with Ramzes and came up with the idea that his Shagya Arabian dam was the differential refining influence in comparison to his Thoroughbred sire. I was sure the old style Arabians (of crabbet, gainey, and CMK blood) with compactness, and and more of a roundly, rotated under hind end would be much more effective in the upper level work in comparison to TB as far as integrating a refining factor.
I was seeing gorgeous WB stallions being bred to our Retired TB ex-racehorse mare base here in the states. The idea back then (in the 80’s) was to take a free OTTB and breed it to a Warmblood. Although the resulting foals might have nice front ends, they were typically of longer rectangle frames, and exhibited a detrimental loss of hind end mechanics in reference to engagement, sit, power, and push.
I had the idea to try an approach and do things the exact polar opposite; breed and old style Arab stallion to warmblood mares with a focus on breeding to compact/shorten the back and loin while also keeping the rotation, sit, and power of the hind end. With a focus for upper level collection work such as piaffe/passage/pirouette/etc mechanics, these movements become easier for the horse to perform and easier for the rider to sit and manage while on the flat.
At fifteen years old with my babysitting money, I started my journey. I went out and bought myself an eight month old Arabian colt and named him “Severn EL Shaddai”. He was a product from the well known “Severn” line Welsh breeder Tiz Benedict’s farm back in the early days when she was also breeding Arabians. This colt was one of the last she ever bred, as she was dispersing her Arab stock to focus on the Welsh side of her program.
I was broke as a teen with a dream and got gifted an incredibly bred Arabian mare “Rollingwood Kandi” to breed to my stallion. She was bred by the well known “Rollingwood” Arabian breeders in their early days. Seems those two influential breeders was my blessing in being able to breed my first foal, the purebred Arabian “SES Hailey”.
At a mere 14h, Hailey was the foundation of my breeding program. She proved and showed the strength of hind-end mechanics I was determined to start my program with. She was of Crabbet, Egyptian, Gainey, and “CMK” breeding. This first home bred filly (shown below) turned out to be the foundation of my now almost thirty year Warmblood breeding program. To this day, you can see the influence of her hind end carried on, now 5 generations down in our horses.
It is undeniable, proven, and THE single most profound pillar of consistency found in every one of our horses.
“SES Hailey” (Left) with her dam “Rollingwood Kandi” (Right) “SES Hailey” - where all our horses get their “generational” hind end from.