The Trakehner Influence on other Warmblood Breeds


Why the Trakehner?

The reason why Trakehner horses and their East Prussian counterparts were entered into almost all other European-based warmblood breeds is probably its background, and time of its rise to stardom when mostly all other "warmblood" breeds didn't even exist.

The success of the East Prussian war mounts, as well as their durability in every day farm work and sport partners for fox hunting and steeplechasing quickly made a name for the breed. And this was long before the first World War and the nearly destastrous end of Trakehnen in 1918. The athletic ability and versatility of this particular breed is obviously a result of its breeding: very early on, the local pony breed, the Schwaike, was used as a foundation, and crossed with stallions of Spanish/Iberian origin, just as much as with true TB stallions that were acquired from England. Oriental stallions were popular too, so quickly the breed emerged as one with very high "special blood" influence, which placed the Trakehner closer to an Anglo Arabian than what is known today as a "warmblood". While most other German warmbloods of that time were basically derived from draft horses, Trakehners were derived from the opposite, and thus their positive influence during the periods of "establishment" of the modern warmbloods of the world is easily explained.

Even before the end of Trakehnen, stallions from Beberbeck, Georgenburg and Trakehnen were sold Westward to positively influence local sport horse breeding, which was only starting out slowly. A famous example is the Vornholz Stud in Westfalia, which was founded by Baron Otto von Nagel, a true visionary in terms of breeding, and the man who founded the German Local Riding Club scene.

By the end of the Second World War, when Trakehen was lost and literally millions of German refugees and their horses had to find a new home in a devastated country, it was mostly hostility that met the newcomers to the West. Their horses were the first to serve as valuable food sources, and it is only due to the individual strength and wisdom of a few private breeders, who managed to hide their most valuable mares from slaughter, that the breed had some foundation to establish itself again. However, the loss for the Trakehner was the gain for the local warmblood breeds, as often refugee horses ended up in State-owned stud farms. Holstein, Hanoverian, Westfalian, Rhineland, Oldenburg and especially Baden-Württemberg-based warmblood breeds were the first to utlilize Trakehner blood during their difficult process of re-defining the use and purpose of the horse in the 40s and 50s: modern machinery made their work in fields obsolete practically over night, so it was either "sporthorse" or exstinction for most of them. During the same time, Swedish and Danish warmblood breeders started the same process, with the Netherlands following shortly after.

Trakehners International tries to tell these stories, in most cases a continued success story up to our days. Trakehner breeders take pride in the role their horses have had and continue to have in warmblood breeding world wide. And at the same time, this "improvement" task is a reminder that Trakehner breeders should strive for breeding sporthorses for the competitive world, without losing the focus of what the breed originates from and what makes it stand out: the influence of special blood!