Equine Gender Selection
I’m Susan Allen. In the ranch horse business geldings bring top dollar, the reason for so many “ gelding only” sales like the upcoming one Saturday, part of the Cattle Barons Weekend in Pendleton. So what would it mean to breeders to if they could pick the sex of their foals, well now they can! So stay tuned for Open Range. Starting last year horse breeders have had a unique tool at their disposal , the ability to have stallion semen commercially sorted allowing them to pick the sex of their foals. Some horsemen worry gender selection could hurt the industry by disrupting the natural genetic balance. Not according to those advocating the use of sexed semen in fact more than a few breeders and trainers don’t think it would have much impact since each segment of the horse business has distinct preferences for either colts or fillies. While ranchers, team ropers and rodeo guys pay more for geldings, cutters and cow horse enthusiast take pride in winning mares who then go on to become valuable for breeding. Plus there’s the fact some bloodlines simply produce better stallions, other’s better mares. Because the stallion determines the sex of the foal researchers at Sexing Technologies discovered it was fairly simple given the proper sperm cell to pix the sex. So they teamed with Equine Reproduction Innovations to offer this process and while it isn’t cheap they’re guarantee a 95 percent success rate in picking gender. I’m Susan Allen
