DEAN SKEATES and CLAIRE CHAMBERS continue their monthly series looking at life at Meacham Stud Competition Yard.

The weather's looking brighter at last and the shows are all getting back into action.

We have had an excellent month with the showjumpers - and the transformation of one of our full working liveries, Distant Prospect, from a former racehorse to a fantastic all-rounder has been the icing on the cake for us after a long, wet winter.

And the dressage horses have been out, having numerous wins and placings.

Dean is trained by Matt Frost and he spent the day with him at his yard, and got to ride a handful of his top horses - thoroughly enjoying it and learning lots. He hasn't stopped smiling since! So, a massive thank-you to Matt.

It's the time of year again when we are all making the decision of which stallion to use on your mares. This is a big time of year on our yard as our aim is to continue to breed top class competition horses to sell, produce and, for ourselves, to compete.

So we are looking for good, proven, graded stallions, and comparing ability, attitude and confomation to suit and complement our graded mares.

For example, if you are looking to breed a showjumper, you'd look for power over fences, speed, scope, technique and a general carefulness.

This favours a lighter horse with a good stride, a powerful and strong hind end and a good shoulder angle and length of neck.

The male parent is known as the sire and the female parent is known as the dam sire, and both are equally as important.

Sometimes, you could say that the dam is a little more important as she teaches the habits when they are young.

Breeding should be taken seriously and the owner should be willing to invest the time and money.

Some costs may include a stud fee, collecting, handling and transporting semen, mare scans, vets bills, and so on The mare should not be bred from, just for the sake of it, and should have valuable qualities to pass on.

And the mare owner, in an honest and unbiased manner, should consider the mare's temperament, correctness of confomation and movement, performance records, soundness, bloodlines and health.

Only a good quality mare should be bred from. Often, the owner will put the mare in foal because she loves her or because she's a pet, rather than because she is a good quality mare. This is where indiscriminate breeding from unsuitable mares has almost become the norm in the UK.

Horse welfare societies have been up in arms about the live export of horses for meat to the Continent, when the fault really lies with the mare owners who have hereditary problems that are still bred from.

Likewise, stallion owners should also be more responsible when covering mares.

Standing a stallion is a time-consuming and expensive business, and should obviously be commercially viable, but should not deter them from taking only sound healthy and top quality broodmares.

Only then would we be able to stop the meat trade, and sound horses would me more the norm. And hopefully horse prices would become more stable as the dead wood' is cleared from our industry.

Generally, the stallion should have proved himself in the discipline or sport that the mare owner wishes to breed for.

Having said all that, good luck to everyone - from all of us at Meacham Stud Competition Yard - with the patter of tiny hooves this season!