By Adriana van Tilburg
Photography: Feldhaus/Oldenburger Verband
It’s recognized that successful breeding is about thinking in generations. That definitely applies to a promising nine-year-old OS-bred stallion, with a line that has been built through two studbooks. His foundation is rooted in Hannover, but continues in the present day with Oldenburg. The name of the stallion? Checkter (Cellestial - Ilonka x Lord Pezi).
Bred by Böckmann Pferde GmbH, Checkter is currently competing at 1m45 under the saddle of the breeder’s daughter, Leonie Böckmann. But we must first look to the past.
Where it all began...
Norm’s damline originated with the Habermann family in 1921, where it is still maintained today. However, in the meantime it has found international horizons, producing top horses for various breeding area, specifically for showjumping.
Norm herself, born in 1928, was the name given to this mare line. She was the daughter of the foundation mare who was rather large at 175 cms. I now quote from the ‘Nations Cups for five nations’ article written by Ulrich Hahne in 2018: “The key mare of this mare line is Feldblümchen (Feldhahn - Allroeschen x Allwieder), born in 1947. She is a granddaughter of Heideröschen, and with her began the sporting rise of this line.
“With Feldblümchen, a mare from the Norm line was bred for the first time to Hanover’s jumper sire of the century, Gotthard. With Gotik, a very special mare was born out of this combination, even if she wasn’t what was expected when we read the studbook’s judgement written at the time: “On the whole, coarse” and “without poetry”.
“However, in Heinrich Habich’s breeding she was crossed with Furioso II, the licensed stallions First Gotthard (based in the USA), Fürstengold and Fürstenstolz, Rincon Furioso, as well as Ingold, by Inschallah AA. The combination of the half-bred Furioso II and the Anglo-Arabian Inshallah AA with the solid Hanoverian mare line and the Arabian influences via Gotthard made this breeding success possible. Georg Vorwerk was certainly not uninvolved, as he was not only the owner of the aforementioned sires, but also gave the breeder, Heinrich Habich, his necessary second home in Lower Saxony at that time. Without that it would have been impossible to breed Hanoverians in Hessen and other federal states at that time. Today such an approach would be unthinkable.”
Feldblümchen
It is interesting to learn more about the foundation of this line and ‘tradition’ is the key word at this point. The stallions used for building up the line all stood at stud with the Habermann family. Quoting from an article written by Claus Schridde: “The common ancestor of all the horses of this Hanoverian damline is the bay mare Feldblümchen, born in 1947, who was presented for studbook registration by her breeder Gustav Habermann (Hänigsen) in 1950. Her sire Feldhahn had only spent three years (1946-1948) as a Celle state stud stallion at the Hänigsen station, whose stallions had already had a decisive influence on this line... To read the complete article you need to be a subscriber
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