Small but Mighty
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Today’s Breeders Speak about the Trials, Tribulations and Treasures of Keeping it Small
by Delores Kuhlwein
“Though she be but little, she is fierce!” said William Shakespeare as he described a feisty and determined character in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. It’s a description worthy of today’s small breeders, too, as they persevere come rain or shine, heartbreak or hilarity.
Even though small breeders share the same passion for the horse and the same drive to improve the breeding standard as their peers in large-scale operations, the unique challenges they face create a very distinct perspective. Whether they have other day jobs, breed only a handful of mares, or operate on a smaller scale compared to their counterparts, these dedicated individuals have developed their own set of noteworthy skills.
Read on as a group of small breeders offers their advice to others wanting to keep things small, such as what to do, what not to do, and how to laugh when it happens.
Keep Your Sense of Humor
Facing predicaments with a sense of humor is a requirement if you’re going to survive as a small breeder. No one knows this better than APHA breeder Nicole Dalton of Waddell, Arizona. She’s learned to take things in stride, whether she’s peering at the monitor in the middle of the night, trying to decide if that shadow is in fact a foal, or while making frequent airport runs. “Of course, picking up semen at the airport is always interesting, especially if you have to go into the airport and carry out the big blue containers. People look at you like you have the plague!” she laughs.
Annie Kamphaus of BMQ Quarter Horses in Nevis, Minnesota, combines dedication with the ability to focus on the lighter side of things. She says, “Our bedroom looks more like the NASA control center than a bedroom. We actually wake to the sound of spilling amniotic fluid! Very rarely do we miss a birth; the one we may miss is at 7 in the morning when everyone is having breakfast and the cameras were just turned off. It’s funny that some of those crafty moms have a sixth sense and can tell when our eyes aren’t watching the screen in anticipation!”
“Last year, when I had four babies due, I had everything all planned and calendars organized for the whole thing,” says APHA breeder Karen Kennedy of Fort Smith, Arkansas. “I had to laugh, because after all my careful planning, one of my mares had her foal two weeks early while we were in Mexico. If you think it’s stressful being there when they’re born, can you imagine being in Mexico and getting a text that we’re having a baby?!!!”
Manage the Daily Grind… and Everything Else
For Kennedy, juggling her job with the annual Breeders’ Halter Futurity forces her to balance home and family life with the mares and babies. “I think time management is the hardest thing to do. You’re not just talking about making time to feed in the morning, or tasks like halter breaking; it can be hauling a mare to the vet or to a breeding facility, which, for me, is an 8-hour round trip,” she says.
Kennedy advises scheduling as much as possible, including blocks of time for necessities like handling babies. “I try to arrange so my mornings are spent with my horses, even though sometimes life gets in the way. Basically, every day it’s me doing everything, so I have to plan as much as I can. Ken, my husband, is great about helping, but he has a real job and he has to be somewhere else every day. You have to try to find a healthy balance that works for you,” she confides.
Like Kennedy, Kamphaus runs her breeding operation without a staff. “The biggest trial of doing this is obviously finding enough time to get it all done. Just getting supper on the table at night can be a challenge! We live in the sandhills of Minnesota, only a couple hours south of International Falls, the self-proclaimed icebox of the world. With that comes the knowledge that horses are truly hay burners… and more hay and grain goes into them than it would in more temperate climates,” she says.
A product of divorce, Kamphaus and her three children struggled to keep the farm going for the first three years after the split. Kamphaus juggled picking up kids from their school activities while keeping up with the breeding and foaling docket. Through a graduate of a local equine program, Haylee Hawkins, Kamphaus discovered a turning point she recommends to other breeders: interns. “Haylee was my first intern, and I’ve always been proud of the fact that she went straight from this internship into a top-notch breeding program down south! Most other families have a relative support system, either emotionally or financially, and that’s something we didn’t have here. We were four against the world! When the interns began arriving on a continual and steady basis, I found I had more time to do things better while they handled the small stuff,” she says.
Kamphaus, who often enlists the help of her friend and partner Jeff, also suggests staying organized, connected, well-supplied, and establishing a good relationship with your vet. “The nearest vet is two hours away, and he has become a dear friend over the years as all this has evolved. He will happily give us advice over the phone if needed. We have a complete and well-stocked vet wall in our lab and can handle just about any emergency that arrives with his help over the phone, if needed! We have all of our foaling stalls under cameras: four without sound and two with sound and color,” she says.
Working both harder and smarter goes without saying. Dalton admits she gets up before everyone else in her household, consisting of a husband and three kids, and she goes to bed after they do, too. She says, “I try to get as many of my horse chores done when I don’t have family obligations.”
Along the way, Dalton figured out the more she increased her own skills as a breeder, the better off she was when it came to time management and expense.
“I started doing everything myself, because I couldn’t afford all the outside expenses. Fellow APHA breeder Kari Dennis taught me how to ultrasound, after she took classes. If you ultrasound enough, you start learning where things are and what things look like. I can now find an embryo and a follicle, and it was pretty much all about practice. When you’re here with your own mares and you can do it yourself, you’re able to get up at 4 a.m. when you know a mare is close,” Dalton explains.
What to Cherish
There’s no doubt that the breeding business can be tough, whether you’re breeding on a small scale or large one. “I’m afraid you have to get a bit tough in this business of raising animals for others to enjoy,” Kamphaus says.
“You’re dealing with nature and animals, and sometimes it’s heartbreaking,” Kennedy says. Her advice is to stop to cherish what you’ve produced. She says, “If you ever question whether you’re cut out for it, just watch the beauty of nature of the mares with their babies. It’s unbelievable to watch how those mothers take care of them. It’s very exciting and restores your faith in the world.”
Dalton, who still jumps up and down when she finds out that a mare is in foal, says there’s nothing like that success. “When you breed your own mares, spend hours picking the perfect cross, check your mare multiples times a day, and drive to the airport at 11 at night to pick up the semen container, the rewards come from doing it on your own. When you ultrasound a mare and you can see that embryo moving, all the way to eventually seeing them go on to win a world title, and you know you created that being, that’s the ultimate,” she exclaims.
At BMQ Quarter Horses, Kamphaus explains that the horses are her kids as well and she wants them to succeed as much as her human and dog kids. “I’ve had interns contact me after a horse they broke out here became an AQHA World Champion! What a feeling! That’s the ultimate goal. I feel pride in all of their accomplishments, just like any mother would! It was my genetic vision of concentrating the Deck Of Stars line to make the BMQ line of horses today the sought after line that’s a total outcross on almost every other popular brand of horse out there,” she says.
When your mom is a small breeder, the entire family learns to value the experience of growing up on a breeding farm. “My favorite memories are my kids going outside to find a pony named Buttercup tied to a sled full of hay with a Christmas wreath around her neck and a letter from Santa on Christmas morning, telling them they better take good care of her,” Kamphaus explains.
What to Remember
All in all, the small breeders say they’ve definitely learned some lessons along the way. “Just like in life, there’s a learning process for anything, and you have to figure out what works best for you,” Kennedy says. “For me, elements like having great veterinary care and a good feeding and worming program work. You should consider other opinions, but I think if you have a program that’s working for you, stick with it and be happy you’re being successful.”
Dalton recommends purchasing the best mares you can and educating yourself. “Save your money and buy the best mares possible, and talk to others who have done some breeding, even if it’s a small breeder,” she says. “Get as much information as you can get, because trial by error is expensive when you breed horses.”
The gamble has to be minimal, advises Kamphaus. She says, “I never had money to gamble with, so our breeding decisions have been well thought out, definitive decisions with outcomes stacked in my favor that held the very lifeline of my family every step of the way. Our livelihood depended on it. But, this is my business and my continual love from the very beginning, so we continue with intern help to see where this dream will take us. You never know when you could be pulling the next World Champion out of a mare…. But, no matter the sex or color, you get a true gift each time!”
