Horse Racing Forum - USA Thoroughbred Races

Forgive me if there is already a topic on horses needing immediate rescue, but a group on FB is trying to save a 2008 mare named Raffian from the kill buyers. I thought she needed a shout out on a reputable BB.

She comes from 4 generations of horses without a winner in the direct female line. And yet her dam has had 6 foals --- again without having produced a winner. There was no information on 4 of the 6 so they probably never raced at all.

AARRGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. Why do people keep breeding mares like this? Raffian is by Aptitude, so she has some Ky connections -- but being dumped at New Holland seems to have been a plausible, if not possible, fate for Raffian given the total lack of success on her bottom line.

Last known trainer: Theresa Carothers
Last known owner: Danielle Carothers

I think that information on such throw away horses needs to be posted so that anyone with connections to the horse can be found or, at the very least, the name(s) of the trainer/owner can be posted on the Internet so they are publically associated with horses sent to kill sales.

I am soooo mad and soooo upset. Not just for this poor mare, but for all TB mares who are bred just because they have papers and ovaries.

Have you contacted the breeder Runnymede Farm? It's a old, well known farm. Perhaps their Public Relations Dept. could be convinced to do right by her. They owned her dam too. Just a thought. Good luck and thanks for caring.

Their website: http://runnymedefarmky.com/

Their blog: http://runnymedefarmky.com/blog/

there was a poster here who had a mare that she desperately wanted to breed, but the mare wasn't really from a successful family. i might be remembering wrong, but a few people pointed out that she really shouldn't breed just for the sake of it, and other jumped on them abt "it's her horse she can do what she wants!"

that said, i really feel like breeding is one of those things where can and should are two very important words to think abt when making your decision.

Did they get saved?

Lord Helpus wrote:Forgive me if there is already a topic on horses needing immediate rescue, but a group on FB is trying to save a 2008 mare named Raffian from the kill buyers. I thought she needed a shout out on a reputable BB.

She comes from 4 generations of horses without a winner in the direct female line. And yet her dam has had 6 foals --- again without having produced a winner. There was no information on 4 of the 6 so they probably never raced at all.

AARRGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. Why do people keep breeding mares like this? Raffian is by Aptitude, so she has some Ky connections -- but being dumped at New Holland seems to have been a plausible, if not possible, fate for Raffian given the total lack of success on her bottom line.

Last known trainer: Theresa Carothers
Last known owner: Danielle Carothers

I think that information on such throw away horses needs to be posted so that anyone with connections to the horse can be found or, at the very least, the name(s) of the trainer/owner can be posted on the Internet so they are publically associated with horses sent to kill sales.

I am soooo mad and soooo upset. Not just for this poor mare, but for all TB mares who are bred just because they have papers and ovaries.

I hope this mare was saved. But I can understand why her dam was bred. Cotton Club Ballet is a half-sister to a GSW/G1Sp filly, plus 3 stakes placed winners and a couple blacktype producers. She has also produced 2 winners. Cotton Club Ballet's dam is a half-sister to a GSW earner of over $700,000 who finished 2nd in both the 1000 Guineas (G1) and Irish 1000 Guineas (G1) plus 2 other SWs, and a couple Spws. There was far, far worse that I saw in the Keeneland September sale.

I worked at Barretts, and it was a great reminder of why some horses don't need to be bred. You'd get yearlings with zero training, club feet, who would get zero bids...and I felt so sorry for them. Their sales page would have zero blacktype and zero winners for 3 generations.

Flanders wrote:

Lord Helpus wrote:Forgive me if there is already a topic on horses needing immediate rescue, but a group on FB is trying to save a 2008 mare named Raffian from the kill buyers. I thought she needed a shout out on a reputable BB.

She comes from 4 generations of horses without a winner in the direct female line. And yet her dam has had 6 foals --- again without having produced a winner. There was no information on 4 of the 6 so they probably never raced at all.

AARRGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. Why do people keep breeding mares like this? Raffian is by Aptitude, so she has some Ky connections -- but being dumped at New Holland seems to have been a plausible, if not possible, fate for Raffian given the total lack of success on her bottom line.

Last known trainer: Theresa Carothers
Last known owner: Danielle Carothers

I think that information on such throw away horses needs to be posted so that anyone with connections to the horse can be found or, at the very least, the name(s) of the trainer/owner can be posted on the Internet so they are publically associated with horses sent to kill sales.

I am soooo mad and soooo upset. Not just for this poor mare, but for all TB mares who are bred just because they have papers and ovaries.

I hope this mare was saved. But I can understand why her dam was bred. Cotton Club Ballet is a half-sister to a GSW/G1Sp filly, plus 3 stakes placed winners and a couple blacktype producers. She has also produced 2 winners. Cotton Club Ballet's dam is a half-sister to a GSW earner of over $700,000 who finished 2nd in both the 1000 Guineas (G1) and Irish 1000 Guineas (G1) plus 2 other SWs, and a couple Spws. There was far, far worse that I saw in the Keeneland September sale.

FWIW, here's Cotton Club Ballet's catalogue page from where she sold at Keeneland two years ago: http://apps.keeneland.com/sales/Nov13/pdfs/3065.pdf
It's not the best page in the world, but there's certainly a decent amount of black type there. (She sold for the grand total to $5,200 to someone in Arkansas.)

I dug around a bit. Cotton Club Ballet's 2010 foal was sold to England, and then disappears from record; judging from his connections I think there's a decent chance he ended up in Qatar--maybe he had a name change? He was a $240k yearling, at any rate. Her 2011 foal went to Ireland, and has a dismal record of 1 win from 22 starts. (Interestingly enough, it looks like he won first out and never did again.) Her 2012 foal was apparently exported to Ecuador, where she has earned black type. Her 2013 foal, now owned by Calumet, broke his maiden in a MSW at Keeneland last week. So she's had 3 winners from 5 foals of racing age, including some South American black type. It's not a great record, but there's a lot worse around. She's now in a regional market, and she may be at the right level there.

I hope it goes without saying that I hope this mare was saved. I wouldn't suggest using her as a broodmare herself, but it looks like she's from a declining branch of a decent family, not a complete no-hope one.