DSP Decides: No Suitability Test Needed for 3-year old Licensed Stallions

Breeding

DSP

The German Sport Horse (DSP) breed society has made a remarkable decision: newly licensed 3-year old colts no longer need to do the mandatory suitability test. They can breed at libitum.

DSP: No testing for newly Licensed 3-year olds

Pro Pferd, the working group of the South German studbooks, decided to do this "pilot project" considering it an "an absolutely horse-friendly solution for the three-year-old stallions licensed for the DSP."

"They can go to stud without being tested," the DSP communicated. "This takes the pressure off the three-year-old youngsters who, among other things, passed the DSP main licensing on the third weekend in January. The licensed stallions can then be prepared for breeding in peace and quiet and only have to take a test under the saddle in autumn/winter 2022/2023."

At the end of 2022 Pro Pferd will decide if this will be implemented in the future.

DSP Decision

The verbatim decision which Pro Pferd took reads as following:

"The stallions will be listed in Stallion Book I for the time being and the offspring from breeding in the 2022 breeding year will receive a proof of pedigree I. In order to be able to be updated in Stallion Book I for the 2023 breeding year, the stallions must either have a 50-day test or a part I sports test in combination with a fourteen-day suitability test or a short test (pilot project) in accordance with the breeding program for German sports horses."

Reforms to the Testing System in Germany

Reforms to the testing system in Germany have been hotly discussed over the past few years.

While the major studbooks still continue to hold their licensing in the autumn, which means colts are presented at an age of barely 2.5 year olds (meaning their training starts at the age of 2). So far Hanover has moved its licensing by one month, and some smaller studbooks hosts the licensing in January but major structural change to the licensing concept is yet to take shape.

In 2019 the breeding department of the German Equestrian Federation made the decision to remove the minimum score requirement of 7.5/7.8 in the mandatory suitability test for 3-year olds and mandatory sport test for 4- and 5-year olds. The individual studbooks could then decide for themselves whether a stallion would lose its licensed status based on the achieved (low) score.

In the end it turned out that stallions no longer "failed" the testing and did not see their permit revoked, making the test itself obsolete.

Pros and Cons

The news of DSP's pilot project was greeted with mixed reactions on social media.

Jan Crome-Sperling, a popular stallion handler who prepares colts for the licensings, commented that, "since no stallion can fail the performance tests due to the lack of a minimum score, and therefore no real selection takes place, this step is welcomed. In addition, the natural qualites are inherited, and not the trained result. It is difficult for many decision-makers to determine the difference between rideability and the riding, especially with 3-year olds."

A counter reaction is that many stallions are already "prepared" in such an unnatural way for the licensing that their natural ability is hard to determine; this especially concerns the lunging phase for dressage horses, or the jumping in freedom phase in which many colts make exaggerated leaps over the fences as a result of their "preparation".

This year a record number of stallions have tested positive to medication or doping at the licensings across Germany, which testifies how prepared and medically "supported" some of these young colts are to make it to the grading.