Growing Slow: Quality horses aren't built over night.

The journey of establishing a breeding program is a long one. Over the years I have seen programs that stand apart, and I admire them. Being the daughter of a horse breeder myself, I know just a little bit of the hard work that it takes to build such a program. Raising the next generation of horses is an art and a passion of mine that sparked when I was young and has never gotten old.

My husband and I have recently began pursuing building our own program. Being successful in the horse industry requires some forethought and step by step planning. It takes a lot of learning, resilience and careful consideration to reach the end goal of having a successful program . People spend years and generations of families developing a solid reputation. My husband and I feel very blessed to have a leg up from my parents, and their already developed program. Both they and my in laws are helping us learn while we develop our own program. Although our program is just barely begun, I hope learning about what we are doing is inspiring for your own goals.

Our vision

Our vison is to be able to breed horses that excel in more areas than one. We run an outfitting business, do ranch work and have kids around which means we need our horses to be multipurpose. We believe that a selectively bred horse has the ability to do this and our dream is to create the type of horse that has the characteristics to consistently excel in various disciplines. For us, the pathway to accomplishing this whole idea is a slow growing breeding program. While this definitely isn't for everyone, our goals will help explain why we prefer this method and why it fits our programs vision so well.

"Sharp" (Out of VLM Cisco Twist x By Boons Shining Nugget) 2025 Stud Colt

Our Goals

Watson and I have found a lot of benefit in including older lines like Doc bar, Blue valentine, King and Hancock just to name a few. There is a fine balance of not reinventing the wheel, while also developing something new. In that balance, regardless of the type of program that's being run, there should always be an improvement upon genetics. Because of my background, growing up in a foundation quarter horse household, the appreciation for older lines is inherited to an extent. As I have grown in my own equine journey, I have been fortunate enough to have several different kinds of experiences that have grown my appreciation for newer lines. As the trends of the quarter horse world eb and flow, I think there is a lot of value in deciding what kind of horse you want to raise/promote, and then sticking to that. Consistency matters to people and is important for creating a reliable breeding program. Four our own program, we are taking our time to nail down what we want our horses to look like, behave like and grow like so that we are 100 percent confident in the results. We want to be very sure that our foals can preform how we market them.

The Ideal Horse

Our ideal ranch horse is built sturdy, with correct confirmation and good bone. They are quiet in personality and easily trainable. We especially value common sense and a gentle temperament. We like a horse to be visually appealing and to have a disposition that is equally appealing. The ideal horse can work cows, pack a kid around, and do a diverse set of ranching/hunting tasks. These are high expectations, and not every horse is going to fit the bill. We like these ideals because then we have things to shoot for and benchmarks to look for in what we keep for breeding stock. Like I said, not every horse is going to reach the Pegasus standard, but if we get really close, we are going to be making some great progress and will be on the right track. One thing to mention is that not everyone is going to have the same standards for conformation. A lot of that depends on the discipline of the buyer. However, there are some basic conformation things that people can mostly agree on, such as good solid feet, straight legs, and a strong topline, haunches and shoulders.

"Dually " (Out of Shine Rose Anna x By Boons Shining Nugget) 2025 Stud Colt

Where Are We Today?

After explaining the reasons that we are starting out the way we are, you might wonder where we are at today in the progress of our breeding program? This year we had three foals, two of them being registerable. The two registerable foals are both stud colts out of mares that have a mixture of performance lines and foundation lines. They are sired by a stud of the same type. Next year we plan to have just one foal out of my Shining Spark bred mare and by my parents heavily foundation bred stud. In addition to the foals, I have a two year old filly who is bred more performance, going back to both Shining Spark and Frenchman's Guy. We are super excited about starting her next spring, and hope to eventually add her to the broodmare band. Of course I have great ideas about doing a little showing here and there however right now we are in a season where the horse plans must remain flexible to our ranch plans. While this doesn't look like much of a serious breeding program, the foundation has started to be laid which we are super excited about. We have goals, we have steps to those goals, and we have actionable plans. Sure it's looking like a LOT of work ahead of us but, long term success is looking good from where we are today. Stay tuned on social media at Snyder Quarter Horses to, Lord willing, watch our program grow!