Quiet Chris wrote:I know a guy who is looking at a few yearlings and one is out of Seattle Slew mare who was born in 1997. Someone told him to never buy a horse out of an old mare. Is there any statistical evidence younger mares are better producers or that mares tend to produce their best runners when they are young? Seems odd, but I guess there could be a biological reason for it.
Secretariat was out of an older mare and so was Sea the Stars, so I guess older mares can produce big runners, but are they just aberrations and for the most part a mares younger years are her best?
It's an old belief that has been debunked, but that has
some truth to it as so:
The logic dictates that if the mare is older and hasn't produced anything noteworthy yet (if she has multiple foals on the ground) she's probably not a good producer. But that's less due to age and more due to sheer numbers. Course it could always be that they've failed to find the magic nick.
To my knowledge there is no biological evidence that an older mare produces less good runners, it's just that if she has many foals on the ground, of racing age and nothing to show for it, she's not likely producing a winner any time soon unless you somehow find THE nick late in her life (less likely than picking a younger mare who already has one or two winners). With a good mare who produces good foals, the quality doesn't seem to decrease with age, certainly. The only biological reason I could think of for a decrease in quality is if the mare is not healthy or has a difficult pregnancy that could affect the foal congenitally, but then she probably shouldn't breeding in the first place.
As with many old wives tales and ancient beliefs, sometimes the saying is passed down without the explanation, and therefore the thinking behind the belief gets distorted.
In both the examples you cited, Somethingroyal and Urban Sea produced winners, excellent ones even, before Secretariat and Sea the Stars respectively.
There were 10 years between Miesque's highest earner (Kingmambo) and third highest (Mingun).
I seem to recall there's an older rather well bred Seattle Slew mare who's last yearling didn't sell or sell well simply because her production record is atrocious and has never produced anything worthy of note. Dunno if this is the one I am thinking of or a different one, but with an older mare, always look at the previous nicks and her production record to date.