DNA Report…Cruise is a Venezuelan Warmblood?

 

I’ve always been curious about Cruise’s ancestry.  Since I bought him via a Facebook video (100% recommended, as nuts as that sounds) and he’s possibly younger, bigger and fancier than his supposed breeding might indicate, I’ve always wanted to do a DNA test.  I asked for the test as a Christmas gift and when my husband got the results he couldn’t keep it to himself.  The test explanation and  disclaimer are below.  Basically, the test is most accurate for purebreds or single crosses and as more dilution occurs accuracy goes down.  Also, breeds that are closely related can test as each other because they have so much common genetic material.  See details below.

Since Cruise was represented to me as a Hanoverian/Thoroughbred/Welsh Cob mix, the Hanoverian and Holsteiner as results one and two make sense.  Hanoverians and Holsteiners generally have a lot of Thoroughbred ancestry, so he really could be partly Thoroughbred either in a recent cross or by actual Holsteiner ancestry.  He moves like a European Warmblood, looks like one, and acts like one, so no big surprises there.  The interesting thing is the Venezuelan Criollo instead of Welsh Cob.  Nowhere near each other on the tree.  Hmmmm…I just assumed that it was lack of accuracy in the test as more crosses enter the picture but when I looked up Venezuelan Criollo on Google images I found these.

They look a lot like him and very Welsh Cob like.  My husband made the good point that someone might have assumed that a unpapered 14hh pony that looked a lot like a Welsh Cob was a Welsh Cob instead of a Venezuelan Criollo.  I doubt we’ll ever know, but it’s a thought, and might actually explain a couple of attributes like a total lack of a Winter coat and a deep intelligence.

All in all, an interesting experience!