Breeding against the odds

The coronavirus pandemic has turned the world on its head. Alice Collins investigates how breeders have fared, and the impact Covid-19 has had on the market

- Alice Collins

“We had to adjust fast,” says Mount St John’s Emma Blundell (pictured, left, with mother Jill), who ran an online auction for the first time in 2020

LIFE as we know it is on hold, at least for now. But when breeders make their decisions, they’re required to look to the following year. So how do they think the pandemic has shifted the landscape and what might come next?

Many in the breeding world have been forced to adapt in this torrid time, flexing to new ways of working or selling. One of those is Emma Blundell of Yorkshire-based dressage stud Mount St John. Covid-19 came knocking for Emma, who was laid low by the virus in March and had to postpone many 2020 plans.

“We pivoted to an online auction for the first time,” she says. “Though it was later than we’d planned due to my illness.”

With the onset of the pandemic and the ensuing lockdown, Emma’s clients could no longer travel to the stud to view horses.

“We’d thought about an online sale before, but Covid was the final nudge,” says Emma, who has sold a total of 10 embryos this year. “We had to adjust fast and create a lot more video and pictures of all the horses for sale.

“Luckily, as a commercial operation, we could continue safely scanning and breeding as normal during the lockdown, whereas some people cut back or maybe vets couldn’t come out. That’s why we decided to put more in-foal mares into the auction than we’d normally sell.”