Could someone please eplain what the differnce is between line breeding and inbreeding? I'm looking at a 4 yo mare that is Sired by her Grandsire, i.e her daddy is her Grandaddy. She is a very nicely put togather horse, sound smart and well bred except for this issue. I've read all I could find on the internet about this and it seems that if the foal is physically sound and correct, then this is acceptable?? hmmm,,, why am I already seeing her barn name as Arkansas??

A linebred horse tends to have some of them same names popping up in the pedigree. Its like breeding horses that are cousins. Breeders are trying to reproduce the highly desrieable traits of certain horse families such as for show horses.

Inbreeding is the mating of extemely closely realted horses such as sire to daughter or siblings. Its not done as often since bad traits are passed along as well as the good. You have to know your bloodlines, the good ,badd and ugly before you'd attem mating extemely close relatives.

In your case, your filly is linebred but its a close call.

The best moral description of this I've heard is:  In humans it would be inbreeding, but breeders of animals call it line-breeding.

You will find in any relative mating that genetic mutations are more prevalent.  Some are labeled good, this is called "fixing a gene."  Others which we find bad are things like mental and physical malformations.

I have limited dealing with handling line-bred horses and they have not been good.  I find that they tend to be very hard headed and difficult to train, not a willing partner but a rival in the barn.  Again this is my own limited PERSONAL experiences and you may take them at the price you paid (nothing.)

The opposite view of this is called hybrid vigor, or the more different genes you mix the more genetically healthy the offspring will be thus reducing the chances of having a "bad gene" doubled and causing it to manifest.

I seriously doubt the person (and most people) that practice this form of breeding actually have enough scientific background to make this a feasible form of improving the breed.

In my world line-breeding = inbreeding.

Scary fact Impressive was "line-bred" to three bars, a 44% relation.  Can anyone say HYPP?  Enough said

If it works it's called line-breeding.

If it doesn't it's called in-breeding.

HA HA! I've heard that often said by the old trainers/breeders and it's true!

I have a wonderful Missouri Foxtrotter gelding.His mother is also his half-sister.They share the same sire.One of the foundation Missouri Foxtrotter sires,Zane Grey,had as his mother,his sister and vice versa.

I'm sure it's not good breeding practice.My gelding has a big motor and tends to be nervous at times.I believe this to be in his breeding in general,however,and not the fact of his mother/half sister.

The man that I bought him from,a well-known and very good breeder in the MFT business,said,"It worked so well that time that I was afraid to try it again."

Kind of like the statement above.

linebreeding=HYPP

linebreeding=HERDA

and a bunch of others.  Basically what they are doing is trying to concentrate the good features, but unwittingly getting the bad by getting two defective recessive traits together. I would steer clear of linebred horses myself.  Is this a Quarter Horse? 

And FYI,you don't have to come to Arkansas to see a bunch of inbreds,especially those that ACT like they are.

Your state and others has their fair share of goofy acting folks too.

Indeed, just because we all have the same DNA down here, doesn't mean we are not intelligent!!!! (makes crime hard to solve, tho!)

Just kidding!

What pedigree does your horse have, there are some very good pedigree people that frequent this forum, one gal in particular I know is outstanding (and resides in Arkansas!!)

Done with care, linebreeding( distantly related horses and usualy farther back in the pedigree) is not dangerous and many good ,solid horses come from the practice. I wouldn't hesitate to buy a linebred horse if it met the criteria I set for a horse.

Inbreeding ( very closely related horses such as sibling and sire/daughter combos) is a bit trickier. You have to know your bloodlines and individuals, you have to know what can and will crop up ( both good and bad).

UC Davis has stated that the genetic flaw lies within Impressive not his ancestors.  With Impressive it was only N/H but constant inbreeding/linebreeding brought about H/H which blew the top of the "jig" as it were.

Poco Bueno had a genetic flaw also called HC by UC Davis but everyone knows the flaw as HERDA.  This causes the skin to become "unglued" and tear open, sadly this tends to show it's ugly head around the time youngsters are being saddle broke.  How'd you like to unsaddle your horse and have huge chunks of hide tear off?

HERDA came around because if a little Poco Bueno blood made good horses what would lots of Poco Bueno blood do?

This line of thinking must be stopped for the safety of our breed associations!