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In the beautiful countryside of the Schwäbische Alb lies the Marbach State Stud. Known worldwide for their Arabian horses, Marbach Stud mainly breeds very high quality warmblood horses. It was one of our teenage dreams to visit Marbach and it was really worth the journey! First we had a guided tour by Mr. Tröster, a now retired driving and riding teacher at the stud, who told us very interesting facts about the different breeds, the daily life and all the activities at Marbach. Marbach is a large training and breeding facility with numberous stallions at stud. The stallions are ridden every day, but are almost never turned out in the paddock, a rather sad life for a horse I think. The broodmares are kept in large stables and are turned out daily. The young horses grow up on the large pastures of the Schwäbische Alb in about 1000m altitude, before they are broke to ride and sold. Marbach keeps a broodmare group of about 40 warmblood mares (Baden-Würtembergisches Warmblut and some Trakhenians) and about 30 Arabian mares. The Arabian mares do still have a strong Hadban Enzahi *stamp*, as most are granddaughters of this influential stallion. Unfortunately the younger mares are obviously of lesser quality than the olders, and especially the foals were very disappointing. The Marbach-Arabians have lots of conformation faults as well as pigmental problems, as there are almost only greys. It's a pity for this famous breed! But anyway, the sight of all those mares and foals, peacefully grazing on the flowery pastures was a joy for heart and soul.
Text by Evelyne, pictures by Tom Koehli and Christa Click here to see some of the pictures we took at Marbach! |
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