1) Congress_inglese_2) Congress_inglese 26/01/11 09.13 Pagina 31
How to Train the Stallion on a Phantom
Paul R. Loomis
MS, Select Breeders Service, Inc. - Chesapeake City, Maryland, USA
Semen collection with an artificial vagina
while the stallion mounts a phantom rather
than a live “jump mare” is practiced by most
professional collection facilities and is a way
to increase safety for both the stallion and the
handlers as well as improve the hygiene of
the collection process. Training a stallion to
mount a phantom can be accomplished with
nearly all stallions including novice stallions
that have no breeding experience and mature
experienced stallions that have previously
bred by natural service.
Prior to attempting to train a novice stallion to
collect off of a phantom it is important to insure that you have all the required elements to
be successful. The required elements are: 1)
an experienced team, 2) a safe and appropriate
environment, 3) appropriate equipment and 4)
the right attitude.
stallion is feeling. The stallion handler is
responsible for the safety of the horses and
people in the breeding shed as he is the only one in a position to control the stallion.
Ideally the handler should have experience
training novice stallions to mount a phantom as the process is quite different from
handling a trained stallion.
2. A mare handler that is a good horse person
and can control the tease mare. Often
novice stallions will need to aggressively
tease the mare positioned next to the phantom before they will be stimulated enough
to mount the phantom. This will make the
stallions extremely frustrated and they may
bite the mare or tease aggressively before
mounting. Mares will try to move away
from this aggressive teasing and biting so
the mare handler must have the ability to
keep her positioned correctly.
3. A quiet tease mare that does not get nervous or skittish around the excited and aggressive novice stallion.
4. A semen collector that has collected numerous stallions and is confident and unafraid when placing the AV on a fractious,
unpredictable and disorganized stallion.
EXPERIENCED TEAM
1. A stallion handler that has experience handling a variety of stallions for breeding. Do
not attempt to train a novice stallion to
mount a phantom with a stallion handler
that is unaccustomed to handling stallions
in a breeding situation. Novice stallions are
going to be nervous and very unpredictable
when first introduced to breeding and since
you are placing them in a situation where
they will inevitably become extremely
frustrated it is critical that the handler does
not make the situation worse because he or
she is also nervous. The stallion will sense
this nervousness and lack of confidence
and it will only increase the anxiety that the
SAFE AND APPROPRIATE
ENVIRONMENT
The breeding shed should be large, quiet, enclosed and have adequate room on all sides of
the phantom, adequate clearance overhead, a
padded rail for close contact teasing of the
mare and excellent footing. It is also helpful if
there is an escape route for the tease mare,
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