Health & Care · #breeding

Health & Care guides tagged “breeding” from the Apex Equine resource center.

• Should you breed your mare? An honest checklist — A foal costs more and takes longer than almost anyone expects. Before you book a stallion, run your mare through the questions a repro vet actually asks.
• The first 24 hours: the 1-2-3 of a healthy newborn foal — Three numbers tell you almost everything about a newborn foal's first day: standing by one hour, nursing by two, placenta passed by three. Miss the windows and you call the vet.
• Caring for the broodmare through eleven long months — Most of a mare's pregnancy is gloriously uneventful. The trick is knowing the few dates that genuinely matter and not over-managing the rest.
• Foal watch: reading the signs and prepping the kit — Mares foal fast, usually at night, and almost always when you blink. Here's how to read the run-up and have the right kit within arm's reach when it happens.
• Weaning without the screaming match — Weaning is the most stressful day in a young horse's first year — and most of that stress is avoidable. The method matters less than the planning around it.
• Choosing a stallion: matching to fix faults, not chase fashion — The flashy stallion in the magazine ad is rarely the right answer for your mare. Good matching is unglamorous: you breed to correct her weaknesses, not to admire his strengths.
• Foaling complications: when minutes matter — Most mares foal cleanly in twenty minutes. The rare ones that don't can lose a foal or themselves in the time it takes to second-guess yourself. Know the few that can't wait.
• Feeding the pregnant and nursing mare — A broodmare's diet barely changes for most of pregnancy, then her needs explode after she foals. Get the timing wrong and you under-feed when it matters most.
• Should you breed her? A clear-eyed broodmare decision playbook — Love is not a breeding credential. This is the structured, scored decision framework we walk owners through before they spend a dollar on a stud fee — so the answer comes from the mare, not the feelings.