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Total estimate of ApHC-Registered horses that might qualify for ICAA
registry: 170,638 (or 30.7%) of the ApHC’s total all-time registrations.
And remember, many of the purer Appaloosas are probably long dead by now.
Three years have passed since this study was done. How much worse is it
today? The 202,195 horses the ApHC registered that would not be eligible
for any ICAA registry classification were direct outcrosses to another
breed. You can figure that a very large percentage of these were Quarter
Horse outcrosses, considering their popularity in the United States, and
considering the overwhelming numbers of them. No doubt those of the ApHC’s
273,384 that do not have parents which would qualify for registry under
ICAA rules would not qualify because of all the Quarter Horses in their
parents’ background.
Ah, but there is the “kicker!” What do you get when you infuse the
Appaloosa with all this Quarter Horse blood? Did you think there were
“pure” like the Thoroughbreds?
Our office received The Southern Horseman magazine recently. The
article, “The Paint Crop Out: A little Color Can Go A Long Way” caught my
eye. I understand that nearly the same article was published in the
Western Horseman in November of 1993. In fact, I found a copy of the
Western Horsemen article, and both articles were written by Lynda Work. It
appears the paint horse crop out in the Quarter Horse is far more
prevalent than most horse people on the fringes of the AQHA and the APHA
(like many Appaloosa enthusiasts and even many Quarter Horse people are)
have been led to believe. The truth of the matter makes it apparent that
it can be extremely dangerous for Appaloosa breeders to breed into almost
any bloodline of the Quarter Horse breed!
It dawned on me that both of these articles may have gone far over the
heads of most Appaloosa owners and breeders, because not everyone has
access to the all-important bloodline information (especially foundation
lines) that we need to make proper buying and breeding decisions. I’ll
admit, the article was an eye-opener even to a bloodline “hound” like me!
I went to feed my stallions after reading Ms. Work’s article, and with the
names of AQHA bloodlines I knew they had in their pedigrees buzzing around
in my brain, I thought, “Man, I oughta do the Appaloosa breed a real favor
and geld these guys!”
First allow me to do some quoting from the above-mentioned article, and
then I will put it into terms the Appaloosa breeder or owner can relate
to:
“There has been a remarkable appearance of (crop outs in) the family lines
of Joe Reed, Old Fred, Traveler, Little Joe (Ed: Little
Joe was the grandsire of Poco Bueno), Peter McCue, and Joe
Moore. Traveler himself has flecks of white in his coat and an apparent
belly spot. One of Traveler’s sons, Blue Eyes, had glass (blue) eyes as
well as Cottoneyed Joe. Barney Owens, a Quarter horse by Old Cold Deck,
had white under his stomach, glass eyes, and a skunk mane and tail.
(Ed: from another article, the description of Old Fred--”In
color, Old Fred was a deep gold with snow white mane and tail. He had a
full blazed (bald) face and white lower lip. On his front legs were two
white stockings extending a considerable distance above the knees. Both
hind legs were white to the hocks with the right hind having a white
stripe stretching up to the stifle. He was also reported to have a white
spot on his left side.) Interestingly, Old Fred and Barney
Owens were a great-grandson and grandson of Old Billy. It is believed that
Old Billy by Shiloh (Ed: Old Billy was out of a mare by
Steeldust) is responsible for the blue eyes and cropping out.
The Old Billy influence extends not only to the Old Freds and Barney
Owens’, but to the Peter McCues, Cold Decks, Skyes Rondos, Blakes, and
Locks Rondos--Just about every Foundation family of Quarter Horses
(emphasis mine). Janus (Ed:
which many people may recognize as the “founding father” of Quarter
Horses) is reported to have had paint spots and was, by today’s
standards, a crop out. He also seemed to have passed on to his offspring
plenty of white. We have seen crop outs from the bloodlines of Skipper Q,
Nick Shoemaker, Doc Bar, Jet Deck, Sir Quincy Dan, The Old Man, and Leo.
Modern Quarter Horses such as Hint Of Conclusive, Precedence, Ima Cool
Skip, Doubly Impresses, and more, are now producing the modern crop outs.
Some current examples of crop outs are Triples Titan, Preclusive, Mr.
Flashy Zipper, To A Te, Miss Precedence and Ollie Tom Tom (now deceased).”
You may be saying, “Well, that sounds like a Quarter Horse problem to me,”
if you don’t recognize any of the above names in your Appaloosa horses’
pedigrees. Indeed, there are “safe” lines such as Absarokee Sunset (and
Beaver), Apache F-730, Golden Flow, Patchy F-416, Red Eagle, Revel F-773,
Revel Junior, Toby, Tony Boy, and Sundance F-500 to name a few of the few.
But have you done or had someone do an extended pedigree on your
Appaloosas? A lot of interesting information you need to know may rear its
ugly head in a six-generation pedigree.
- Bright Eyes Brother has long been suspected of putting too much
white on Appaloosas. Well, no wonder! He goes back three times to Peter
McCue and once to Old Fred.
- Colida goes to Peter McCue three times. Hands Up and High Hand have
also long been suspected as well.
- Hands Up goes to Traveler, and High Hand goes to the McCue line and
Nick S (who was linebred Old Fred).
- High Spots and Kelley’s Sonny Boy both go to Traveler three times.
- Honey Toe goes to Traveler and McCue.
- Joker B goes to Old Fred and Steeldust.
- Mansfield Comanche goes to Traveler.
- Might Bright goes to Steeldust also, plus he is a son of Bright Eyes
Brother.
- Norell’s Little Red is Steeldust, Peter McCue and Old Fred.
- Navajo Britches goes to Traveler twice and Peter McCue twice, plus
to One Eyed Waggoner.
- Quannah goes to Peter McCue twice.
- Wapiti goes to Old Fred several times and twice to Peter McCue, as
does Wild Hope.
- Comanche’s Equal goes to Traveler twice and Peter McCue, as do his
sons, Silver Strikes Equal and Gold Strike’s Equal.
- Rustler Charger goes to Peter McCue (through Sheik P-11 who was by
Old Fred).
- Top Hat goes to crop out lines at least twice.
- But the coup de grace is Prince Plaudit, who goes to Old Fred five
times!
No wonder the Quarter Horse and Paint people laugh at us! No wonder the
big push is on to consolidate the Appaloosa, Paint horse, and Quarter
Horse breeds into one (mongrel) breed called the “Wester Horse.”
Oh, you didn’t know that EITHER? |