Interchanging Seasons for Work with Horses

Taking Advantage of Opposite Hemispheres to Gain More Experience

Oct 18, 2009

For horse studs, particularly Thoroughbred and Standardbred, the year tends to run in seasons, focused on classes of horses with a little bit of overlapping between them.

The southern hemisphere year starts on a Thoroughbred stud with yearlings being put through an eight or so week preparation for upcoming sales. This tends to actually start December of the previous year and sales are set up over a five or so month period, catering to different classes of pedigrees.

They are spaced out so that generally one lot of yearlings can go through an eight week preparation and be sold in time for the next lot to come in and be prepared for the following sale.

This brings us to around May and at this point the previous year’s foals have or are being weaned and handled. Some may even be prepared for a weanling sale with trends in the market currently causing owners to earn nearly as much for their weanlings as they could expect to get for their horse twelve months later when sold as a rising two year old.

July builds up to the breeding season with the first foals due August 1 and mares able to be bred from September 1. August through to December 31 marks the breeding season with some yearlings coming in toward the end of this time in anticipation for the following year’s sales.

Northern Hemisphere Routines

January 1 marks the birthday of Thoroughbreds in the Northern Hemisphere with February 1 being the date that breeding of horses begins. This continues until the end of June.

Yearling sales range from around late July through to December of the same year with young horses being weaned and handled at this later stage in the year, also.

Keep in mind that young horses are generally weaned from their dam or mother around 5-7 months of age. Consequently, depending on the month in which the foal was born and how busy the property is, weaning can be carried out over a number of months.

Seasonal Work

Generally workers have a preference between yearlings and broodmares, stallions and foals. Any person who is eager to build up experience and perhaps focus on one particular area of stud work is able – especially in the Thoroughbred industry – to take advantage of the opposite working hemispheres.

A lot of the larger studs cater to this, being set up internationally and able to move workers between studs that are owned by the same person or persons. Examples of this are Coolmore and Darley.

Say you’re only interested in breeding horses, it’s possible over a twelve month period to gain two seasons worth of experience spending January – June in the Northern Hemisphere and travelling down to the Southern Hemisphere for their breeding season from August to December.

Doing so means that if you do plan to specialise in a particular area, you’re gaining twice the amount of experience in this field than someone who stays all year round on any given stud.

If your interest is in the year round routine of a particular breed of horses, consider checking out another place at the end of a twelve month period so that you’re gaining experience on a number of different properties. Doing so allows you to see how things are done differently. This is beneficial if you plan to manage a property or run your own in the future or just want to increase your knowledge with regards to working with horses.

The same practice is often utilised by vets who have recently finished studying and plan to work in the field of equine reproduction. The world wide use of horses and opposite yearly routines of northern and southern hemispheres can easily be put to your learning advantage.

The copyright of the article Interchanging Seasons for Work with Horses in Horses is owned by Chris Thomas. Permission to republish Interchanging Seasons for Work with Horses in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.