HUNGARY (by Péter Rásky – translated by by Andrea Janászik) Organized by the Hungarian Sport Horse Breeders’ Association on February 21-22, the first major breeding event of the year, the Breeders’ Weekend has been at the centre of interest for several weeks, and exceeded all expectations for breaking records. The event was divided into two main parts. The sale horses were shown on Saturday, while the breeding stallions and stallion prospects on Sunday. Last year was the first time that the stallion test was carried out with a similar, extended program, with great success from the very first moment.

The event has been advertised for many months, to give owners enough time to prepare their horses, so this year we saw 30 sport horses, a record number of 48 stallion prospects, and nine approved breeding stallions. Some of the sport horses also took part in the stallion test. In hindsight, it might have been advisable to pretest the stallions. The Hungarian Sport Horse breed works with altogether 600 mares, so this huge amount of new stallions is unnecessary. Of course, the need to improve the quality may explain these numbers, and the 13 stallions approved after this event perfectly meet this requirement. The fact that 100 horses took part at the show is the sign of new interest for the good sport horses and stallions. Even though the time was a little bit short for so many horses, the Breeders’ Weekend was a well organized event with good atmosphere, so congratulations to the organizers.

Sales horses

Even though some of the previously reported 32 horses didn’t all appear, more than 20 horses could still be seen free jumping on Saturday. Some horses were already sold before the event from the catalogue, and a few others were sold during the weekend. The number of home-bred horses was almost as much as that of the imported ones. There were discussions among the breeders whether the presence of imported horses might decrease the chances of the Hungarian horses or not, but it seems that their presence created a wider range and a possibility to compare our own horses to others. Finally, it was sure that the Hungarian breeders had nothing to be ashamed of...

TO READ THE COMPLETE ARTICLE CLICK HERE TO SUBSCRIBE TO BREEDING NEWS