Does anyone have mixed breed drafters? What are they? Hoe do they compare to any "purebred" you've had?

Thanks

We have two. A clydesdale, quarter, percheron. He is a very willing worker who is eager to please. His prefered speed is usually faster than I want though.
The other is a standerbred, Percheron. she is way too hotheaded and a real challenge to train I have pretty much given up on her. I do not think the breeds matters near as much as the attitude.
Bryan

we get 10 times or more the miles out of the crossbred!

I've had mixed draft breed chunks. They work fine. It';s the individual horse that matters, not the breed.

I have a haflinger quarter horse cross that I have been breaking. He seems to be a really good minded horse and acts as if he might enjoy working too. My dad has two horses of the same breeding and he says the same about his. In my area it is pretty common to see crossbreds and some of them seem to be good horses.

There is this wonderful thing called Hybrid Vigor. Yes it is real. I have been told that the belgain percheron crosses are some of the best working horses you will find. An old puller around here liked a belgain with a percheron X TB. He swore by those for light weight pullers. I have qh x welsh ponies.

A man that worked at the sheep experiment station near here once said, "The only purpose of a registered animal was to get purebred animals and the only purpose of a purebred was to be used in a cross breeding program." The problem is that in an ideal world that cross is then the terminal cross. At what point have you lost the hybrid vigor and have mutts?

If you are thinking of breeding a crosbred, keep in mind that the size of the mare(breed) is very much going to affect the mature size of the colt. For an extreme example. A Belgium stud crossed with a shetland mare will have a matureoffspring of say 12-13 hands. A Shetland stud croosed on a Belgium mare will mature at 14-15 hands. So it is important to know in the ctoosees what the dam and sire were. And it is harder to know how the cross will work. There can be cosiderable differences in full brothers and sisters.

You crossbreed to get using animals. The Kitteridge ranch ran about 100 brood mares. Bred some to big studs to get work horses and the rest to decent saddle horse studs. Most of these mares weighed about 1000-1200 but there were a few that weighed about 1600. Anytthing that didn't fit their desires at the time were traded for other brood mares of different bloodlines or sent to slaughter.
Real good set of horses if you was man enough to handle them. They traded a lot of them to Orrie Summers whose main goal was to get you dumped off. He sold a lot his excess horses to rodeo outfits.

Here in Wyoming the cattle ranchers like the Morgan Quarter Horse cross. I bred my Morgan Stud to many good Quarter Horse mares and the result is a horse that works all day everyday! And with lots of Stamina that a QH just doesn't have.

They tell about the Bare Ranch buying a semiload of quarter horses. They was trailed from Cedarville out across the smokey desert to where the wagon was working. When those quarter horses got there, they was so lame they couldn't be used until the next year.

Try mules, they are the ultimate breed crosses, ultimate hybrid vigor. The reason they are sterile, is because God knew we couldnt stand anything better, so he fixed them to be the last equine cross.

Hey Tim, I surenuff agree with you on the mule deal. I've owned some great horses, but I've got a black stockin' legged mule that will surenuff beat a billy goat through rough country. Also owed several mule spans that had more heart and try than any team of horses.

the breeds we have were developed through crossing

I have a Perch X Paint-Quarter. He's just turned 2 on the 27th of March. He's gonna be my light driving horse. Haven't done any training yet. I need to hurry up.