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A mare is an adult female horse or other equine. [1] In most cases, a mare is a female horse over the age of three, and a filly is a female horse three and younger. In Thoroughbred horse racing , a mare is defined as a female horse more than four years old.
A filly is a female horse that is too young to be called a mare.There are two specific definitions in use: In most cases, a filly is a female horse under four years old.; In some nations, such as the United Kingdom and the United States, the world of horse racing sets the cutoff age for fillies as five.
Similarly, a yearling is a horse of either sex between the ages of one and two. A young female horse is called a filly , and a mare once she is an adult animal. In horse racing , particularly for Thoroughbreds in the United Kingdom, a colt is defined as an uncastrated male from the age of two up to and including the age of four.
Contrary to popular misuse, "colt" refers to a young male horse only; "filly" is a young female. Though many horse owners may simply breed a family mare to a local stallion in order to produce a companion animal, most professional breeders use selective breeding to produce individuals of a given phenotype, or breed. Alternatively, a breeder ...
When a mare is pregnant, she is said to be "in foal". When the mare gives birth, she is "foaling", and the impending birth is usually stated as "to foal". A newborn horse is "foaled". After a horse is one year old, it is no longer a foal, and is a "yearling". There are no special age-related terms for young horses older than yearlings.
A yearling is a young horse either male or female that is between one and two years old. [1] Yearlings are comparable in development to a very early adolescent and are not fully mature physically. While they may be in the earliest stages of sexual maturity, they are considered too young to be breeding stock. [2]
The practice of breeding a mare through human assisted means, with no contact between the stallion and mare. It is done for many reasons, including to protect the two animals, to allow a mare to be bred to a stallion a long distance away, [1]: 11 or to allow a stallion to be bred to a larger number of mares than would be possible via natural cover.
The most common hybrid is the mule, a cross between a "jack" (male donkey) and a mare. A related hybrid, a hinny, is a cross between a stallion and a "jenny" (female donkey). [150] Other hybrids include the zorse, a cross between a zebra and a horse. [151] With rare exceptions, most hybrids are sterile and cannot reproduce. [152]