.⚝. Eugene Farm Log

[Eugene]

Now what I'd really like to know is how this filly can have such high strength conformation (58), and yet her breeder's report comment still isn't green! (I know they're two separate metrics I'm just bitter)

Getting both strength and balance at the same time is proving to be quite the challenge. They'll get there though.

.⚝. Silverfish

[Aubergine]

GREEN STRENGTH!

Endermite

[Aubergine]

It's been a minute! Here's the data from the last few generations

Gen 22 Mares


Colts


G23 Mares


& Colts


Some minor changes these last few weeks; I've started recording body type & weight class. It's not a dealbreaker if a foal falls outside of what I'm looking for, however the thicc carthorses do not great show jumpers make. On that note I got GREEN STRENGTH! Only one, and he didn't do well in competitions, but the herd is moving in the right direction!

As you can see, scores are maintaining at least. I'm still not expecting great performance in this line right now - there's too much change happening.

For G23 I trawled the Stud ads for a while and found some okay Thoroughbreds to mix in. I was looking for green+ balance and at least average strength, with the goal of lighter body types a few generations down.

QOA Stud
ೃ⁀➷ S I R E N

These two actually played really well with the mares! My personal favorite baby last generation was Gold Digger, who has gone on to produce very well in G24!

Gold Digger

Moving forward, the main goal is to maintain high balance (it's been slipping recently ) while increasing strength in medium-light to very lightly built horses. It may be impossible; I know that some comments are linked to phenotype so strength comments may be reserved for heavier horses, but only time will tell!

[Eugene]

Gen 24 data

Fillies


Colts


Can you tell I've been playing a lot of Minecraft? Nothing too exciting this generation. The pink & purple highlighting refers to which outside line got mixed in last gen, so I don't get them mixed up.

No more green strengths this time around, but lots of 'powerful legs' comments!

[Eugene]

Gen 25! (omg how long will this take?)

Mares


Colts


Pharmacology has been kicking my butt, so I haven't been as active recently. As a result of that I rarely have premium, which makes sorting through foals a huge pain. This generation I laid out a few ground rules: Gold balance, positive strength, medium-med/light build, and hopefully positive agility and speed comments. From there I just kept everything until there were enough foals to cull the worse half (based on BR). After this I finally got premium again and could fill out the rest of the chart.

The goal is still rounded hips that add both balance and strength. There is probably some specific conformation combination that allows those numbers to climb. I got there in my last project with movement. Flat hips improved movement significantly more when paired with other specific stats (which I forgot sorry). By that logic there should be a sweet spot with strength/balance. If I continue to select for high scores/WPS & high BR the conformation should shift naturally.

Looking ahead, this coming generation is a rough one. I believe I've mentioned previously that good strength tends to skip generations? While in G25 I was nearing green strength, in G26 I'm lucky to get an 'Olympics' comment! And when I do, the foal has GREEN balance! Strength and balance do not play nicely together, at least not yet.

[Aubergine]

What an exciting update! Now I just need to fix my 1000 in-game years of selective inbreeding... Q-Q

The truly difficult thing is going to be finding a strategy that will be both effective and possible to pull off in-game. Thankfully, despite every single horse I own having 100+ COI, I don't think its actually that bad? I've made an effort over the years to keep COI down (though the calculation has changed so who knows lol) so getting it below 100% is a reasonable goal.

Now for strategy. I've been reading, and I think my best bet is to refer to this paper here ->

SONESSON AK, MEUWISSEN THE. Minimization of rate of inbreeding for small populations with overlapping generations. Genetical Research. 2001;77(3):285-292. doi:10.1017/S0016672301005079

Basically they have compared different strategies for reducing the rate of inbreeding over time with different survival rates of offspring/random vs selective mating/larger vs smaller generation sizes, and come up with what they consider to be the best short-term solutions (short-term meaning <100 in-game years).

Quick disclaimer, this probably won't work! I'm using this post to record my thought process so I can more effectively tweak my breeding strategies in the future-> it's not intended to be a guide.

So the paper outlines a multigenerational approach where only the oldest animals were able to breed + one pair from the second oldest generation. This caused the population to break into sublines separated by age. With this method, the rate of inbreeding within the sublines increased, while the rate across the population remained lower. Now to be fair this paper is as old as me, so real world strategies have likely improved. For this game however, this should be fine.

The teams hypothetical population had four distinct sublines, based on the assumption that an animal was sexually mature by age 1, and able to reproduce until age 9. HWO is a bit different, so Group A will be 4yo, and Group B will be mature when A is 8yo, and so on. Excel will be my friend here. I'll breed each group for 4 years, then pause to train & test the foals/cull the lowest-performing ones. Those will become Group B. Group A breeds again + 1 pair from Group B, and so on.

There will be some differences: unlike in the simulations outlined in the paper I have the option of pulling from outside populations. Unfortunately, everybody else is having the same issues as me with high COI, so finding competitive horses that aren't inbred will be hard. Until I see how the new code works none of these plans are set in stone.

Current game plan

- Finish training up G26 (they are my new oldies). Mark them as Group A & create yet another excel sheet for tracking breeding groups & relatedness.
- I've picked up 4 AC mares (and 0% COI crosses from the sales page). I'll buy 4 more, and see what happens to the stats/COI when I breed my studs to them.
- Go through G26 horses & figure out who is the least related to who. The above breeding plan calls for minimum coancestry breeding (which will be a huge pain...)
- Breed each G26 horse to a 0% COI test horse (ideally one with decent stats) and record the resulting foals COI. That should give me an indicator of which horses have the lowest overall COI's in the herd

[Eugene]

G26-A COI/relatedness info

COI of the foal when crossed w/ 0% COI mare
Combee - 96.88%
Pink Wind - 96.74%
Lapras - 96.88%
The Fool - 96.80%
Guache - 96.80%
Bee's Knees - 96.80%
Frog Prince - 96.81%
Capable - 96.73%
Oom Oom At
Honey King
Witchhunt - 96.80%
SeaKing - 96.88%

COI of foal when crossed w/ o% COI stud
Blastoise - 96.81%
Witchheart - 96.80%
Tombow - 96.80%
Sprog - 96.81%
Scrafty - 96.80%
Tangela - 96.80%
Antlion - 96.81%
Rain Frog - 96.74%
Rabbit's Heart -
Froglight -
Copic Trap -
Established -
Void Wyrm -
Battlebane -

[Aubergine]

So it's been a hot minute... whoops! That study proved to be way too complicated to implement properly into my game play, and ultimately was sucking the joy out of it. I've gutted the herd (which I kind of regret now, wish I'd kept some mares lol) and my current game plan is to transition them over to Anglo-Arabians. I've also got a low COI population of Java's that are starting to get green balance as well.

The following is a list for me to keep track of available public studs

Thoroughbreds
Gallant Rose
5* Anglo-Arabian - 55k HGP - Average balance, seems strong

TB Line 11
2* Anglo-Arabian - 34k HGP (but 0% COI) - Really well balanced, not much natural strength

Early Cupid
3* Anglo-Arabian - 64k HGP - One balanced horse, seems strong
>>> has decently performing cutting horse in lineage, maybe has some heart?

JD Precious Dash
4* Anglo-Arabian - Decent balance, average strength
>>> Good Win%

Ocean Freak
3* Anglo-Arabian - Very sturdy, strong as any
>>> Good Win%, cute face/looks proportional-ish

CharmingGaze
4* Anglo-Arabian - Very balanced, strong as average
>>> Small head, good conformation

$Light Heart
4* Anglo-Arabian (too short) - One balanced horse, quite strong with training

Arabians
Midnight Gold Limit
3* Anglo-Arabian - Could do ballet, average amount of strength

Prodigial
5* Anglo-Arabian - Tip over, strong as average

Cloudless
3* Anglo-Arabian - Could do ballet, average strength
>>> Good Win%

[Aubergine]

Anglo-Arabians
Hunter
Endgame
[F#] Real
LM Executioners Tax
Just Dune
Earthly Tower