MADAM,

Now that the study on the equine genome has been underway for over 15 years we can begin to put together some facts and history that will remind us, that contrary to common sentiment and overall ‘industry wisdom’, that the Irish Horse is at the head of a genetic fountain of sport performance.

The Irish Horse shares this bedrock of sport genetics with the English thoroughbred, and surprising the American breeds of thoroughbred, Quarter Horse and Standardbred as well as our Morgan, Saddlebred, Tennessee Walker and others. What is the common root in all these fabulous sport breeds? It is the diminutive, fast, and gaited Irish Hobby.

Before there was a thoroughbred, the fastest racehorse in the world was the Irish Hobby. It gave its speed to the developing English Running Horse which, combined with some Barb lines and its parent Hobby, were the basis of the original racehorse studs in England (Tutbury, Sedbury, Helmsley etc.), from which the thoroughbred arose.

King Henry even imported them for first class saddle horses and racehorses and they were gaited as well as fast (because of their comfortable saddle gaits and sweet dispositions they were the highest rated saddle horse, often given as diplomatic gifts to foreign dignitaries).

Science has now identified, that yes, the speed gene originated back in those little ‘native horses’ (Hill, Bower).

Indeed, since before the time of Christ, the Irish people were racing the speedy Celtic Horse in chariots. The genetic trail of the Hobby (Jansen et al & Rojo et al) leads back to the northern Iberian Peninsula to at least 600 BC, and even at the time of Pliny (67 AD) they were known far and wide as the best racehorses in the world. The Celtic Horse, which became the Hobby, was used as a saddle and racehorse, not a plow horse; it was always a sport horse.

The Hobby was the fastest racehorse in the known world up until the late 1600s, when Cromwell did his best to eradicate all the racing stock of the previous regime both in Ireland and England. Unfortunately he succeeded, and the Irish Hobby and English Running Horse were largely destroyed.

Our good fortune in America was that we had continuously imported Irish Hobbies into the Massachusetts and Virginia colonies before they were wiped out. The first documented Hobby shipment was in 1611 in Virginia and they continued into the 1660s. It is because our original colonial breeders were racehorse breeders that they brought in large amounts of the fastest horse in the world: the Irish Hobby, and a direct result is we have three of the highest rated racehorse breeds here in America today.

The speed, the temperament, and even the gaits of the Standardbred and our wonderful saddle breeds, all go directly back to those early imports. This top source of athleticism is what is behind the Irish Sport Horse as well, and also provides a tremendous genetic affinity in true sport genetics with the other breeds that spring from this same well, making it a cornerstone of sport breeding for those who understand genetics.

Science has confirmed for us what the historical researchers have found, that the sport horse genetics that provided the large heart gene (traced to Hautboy whose dam lines are Hobby, not Arabian as originally believed), and the speed gene, once again not from an Arabian but from the Irish Hobby stock.

Also in my personal research into the origin of the jumper trait, it has led me all the way back to an early thoroughbred whose genetics are largely Hobby and Barb as well. And even all those jumper lines that are named as ‘the’ source of jump in the warmbloods go directly back to a critical mass in that same horse.

ORIGIN OF MODERN HORSES

And so it is that I am pleased to remind you that modern sport originated with the original Irish Horse, not with the European. If you read the genetic studies on the origin of the modern horses you will find the base stock between the Irish Horse and the European is different, the Irish is part of the D1 haplogroup while the European stock is from the C haplogroup---they have different base ancestries (Jansen et al).

We are in a world equine environment today that is dominated by the very organised and powerful European Federation (WBFSH), which spreads fantasy literature on the roots of sport, published by themselves and their member registries.

For example, the American Holstein Horse Association states on their website that their sport horse breeding program reaches back 700 years! However, they fail to mention that the horse they refer to was being bred by Catholic monks in Jutland- which first of all was in Denmark not in Germany - and the breeder was the Church, not the German government, and most important: it was a draft horse—not a sport horse.)

You will find if you examine and test their proclamations of ‘centuries of sport horse breeding’, that there is no true history or science behind their outrageous claims.

What Europe was producing up until the mid-1800s was a draft horse, the Black Marsh Horse-based breeds (such as in Jutland) or in Germany it was the Schwere Warmbluter, which despite its name ‘warmbluter’ was a cold blood (draught horse), not what we Anglos call a warmblood, and these breeds are the polar opposite to the true sport horse.

If you have wondered why, since crossing in their ‘superior’ sport breeds onto your own, that your world rankings have fallen, and the answer just might be, because you are diluting your own excellent sporting genetics. (This is a problem in America as well.)

It was only in the mid-1800s greater Europe began importing huge amounts of Irish Hunters, Thoroughbreds, Yorkshire Coach and Norfolk Trotters to improve their slower draft-based stock, with the goal of producing a better coach horse (base of Holstein, Hanoverian and Oldenburg).

In this same time frame, the lighter coach or carriage breeders of Europe were importing Irish Hunters, Norfolk Trotters, Thoroughbred, and even American Running Horses and American Trotters to advance their slower less athletic breeds (base of Selle Francais). These new improved stocks were the basis of their modern ‘warmblood’ breeds; but they got their sport elements from Ireland, England and even from us in the States—and all our breeds got their sport abilities from the Irish Hobby.

And so it was as the 1900s dawned, Europe had some stock that could move, run, trot and jump. I know this because I have spent 30 years researching bloodlines and building a database back to the 1600s, not just on American stock, but that of Europe as well. And I can tell you all genetic sport roads go back to the Irish Hobby. You have in your Irish Draught, Sport Horse and Connemara, some of the greatest concentrations of those very same precious sport genes.

So my friends in Ireland, if you are thinking you have lost your Irish Horse, or think its sport success is in the past, then you are wrong.

The best sport genetics in the world are sitting there in your backyard waiting for you to recognize the genetic gold you have and to intelligently preserve and concentrate it again.

You have it all and the best news is it is not too late to save it, you even have an organisation, the Traditional Irish Horse Association, already working on this project.

Kathleen Kirsan ,

Lincoln,

California,

USA.

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