¶ General
Mares and Stallions of the same breed and at least 3 years of age can be bred to each other. Keep in mind that your estate cannot be over capacity in order to breed.
This article is about the technicalities and risks of the breeding process. If you want to know more about which horses to breed with each other and what to expect, read Inheritance 101.
Please note that it is NOT possible to cross-breed horses. They need to be of the same breed in order to breed.
¶ How To Breed
¶ Breeding with a stud
You can breed horses via the "Actions" box in the Summary tab in a horse's profile.
| Icon | Action | How To | Fee |
|---|---|---|---|
 |
Breed your mare to your stallion |
Under the Summary tab on your mare’s profile will be a heart-shaped icon with the text “breed this mare” (unless she is already pregnant or younger than 3). After clicking on it, you can select one of your own stallions. Now click the orange “Breed” button. You can also access your stallion's profile first and follow similar steps. |
Free |
|
or  |
Breed your mare to another player's stallion |
Some players put their stallions up for public stud, which means you can breed your mares to these stallions in exchange for a price of their owner’s choice. You can look for studs with the Search function or in the dedicated Forum category. Once you have found the stallion of your dreams, go to his profile. There will be a banner saying, "this stallion is standing at stud" with a stud icon. After clicking the icon (or the “breed with this stud” icon in the summary tab), you can select one of your mares and your preferred payment type. Now click the orange “Breed” button. |
Stud fee set by the stallion's owner |
¶ Breeding using semen vials
Mares can be artificially inseminated with semen vials. To be able to inseminate a mare, she needs to be brought in heat first by giving her a hormone injection at the Veterinary. Semen vials can be collected from your own stallions at the Veterinary, or bought from other players on the Market. Inseminating mares can also be done at the Vet.
Using hormone injections or insemination does not affect your mare's chances of a successful pregnancy.
¶ Breeding Risks
Currently, there are no limitations or risks connected to pregnancies or studding in Horse Reality. Horses do not lose energy and can't get hurt in the process. Even mares giving birth can still be entered in competitions without complications.
¶ Pregnancy Failures
Breeding two horses together doesn't always result in a (living) foal. The covering can fail, the pregnancy can result in a miscarriage, or the foal can be born with a lethal illness such as Overo Lethal White Syndrome.
¶ Failed Coverings
The semen quality (fertility) of the stallion determines the success rate of the covering. Semen quality can be tested on all adult horses at the Veterinary. Only stallions that have received the Clinical Approved predicate are certain to have a semen quality of 75+ points.
These are the chances of failed coverings depending on the semen quality:
- 81 - 100 semen quality = 5% chance of failed covering;
- 65 - 80 semen quality = 10%;
- 50 - 64 semen quality = 15%;
- 25 - 49 semen quality = 20%;
- 0 - 24 semen quality = 40%.
If the coverage has failed, you will receive a message on the 2nd day after breeding that your mare does not seem to be carrying an embryo. This is because, in real life, you will know approximately within 40-50 days if your mare got pregnant, roughly translating to 2 days in Horse Reality. You can cover her again immediately after receiving this message.
Please note that these chances do not follow the same intervals as the labels of semen quality.
| Semen quality (number) |
Semen quality (label) |
Chance of a failed covering |
|---|---|---|
| 81-100 | Excellent | 5% |
| 65-80 | Good | 10% |
| 61-64 | 15% | |
| 50-60 | Average | |
| 41-49 | 20% | |
| 25-40 | Fair | |
| 21-24 | 40% | |
| 0-20 | Poor |
¶ Miscarriage
Even after the mare got successfully pregnant, there is always a 5% chance that she might lose the embryo/foetus/foal prematurely. This is not affected by energy, training, health or other factors. If your mare miscarries, you will receive a message on the 4th day of pregnancy. This means that she became pregnant but lost the foal after 4-5 months. You can cover her again immediately after receiving this message.
When breeding two horses that both carry any of the white spotting alleles together, the pregnancy will fail on the 4th day if the foal is W/W (25% chance). This is because, in real life, homozygous white spotting is believed to be embryonic lethal in most cases. By now, there is proof of horses with two W alleles being born alive, but at the time of code implementation, this was not yet known.
Please note that both the failed pregnancy and the miscarriage result in the same notification.
¶ Foal Death
Currently, foals can only die prematurely from Overo Lethal White Syndrome (OLW/OLW). Due to this illness being very painful for the foals, they are euthanised immediately after birth in Horse Reality. The owner will receive a notification stating the condition has been found in their foal and that it will be humanely euthanised. There is no fee nor a cure.
|
¶ Successful Pregnancy
During the first four days after covering, the message on the Summary tab says: “Covered X days ago by [Stallion]”. This means there is still the possibility of a failed pregnancy or a miscarriage. On day 5 (after the daily roll over), when these four critical days have passed, the message will change to: “Due on [date] from [Stallion]”. Once this happens, you can be sure your mare will give birth. Congratulations! The ultrasound option at the Veterinary will become available to reveal the gender of the foal.
A pregnancy takes between 13.5 to 17 real-life days. This was decided to get a little variation within the game. Otherwise, all horses would give birth simultaneously (14.5 days ~ 11 game months). The exact duration within that timeframe is random for each pregnancy. There is no way to speed up pregnancies, not even through artificially ageing the mare.
¶ Giving Birth
On the last day of pregnancy, beginning at midnight (00:00 in-game), the message on the mare's Summary tab will say, “Due today”. Actual labour will begin sometime throughout this new day. You will not get a notification for this, but you may be able to catch it by checking on the mare every once in a while. As soon as she goes into labour, the message on her Summary tab will change one last time to “Giving birth”. The new foal will appear at the next half or full-hour mark, whichever comes first. This delay is normal and should not be reported as a bug in the forums. You will get a notification once the new foal has arrived.
When a pregnant mare is sent to the Retirement Home, she will no longer give birth. When a player deletes their account all their horses get retired and, consequently, any pregnant mares will also no longer give birth.
When a mare with an unweaned foal is retired, the foal will temporarily not be visible in the stable block (its page can still be accessed through your profile, when clicking between your horses,…) but it will return to your stable once it turns 6 months old.
¶ Planning the Time of Birth
Time of birth for foals is always at the minute :00 or :30 of an hour and a mare goes into labour 16 hours after she was covered (after 13.5 - 17 days of pregnancy, that is). Some players use this method to plan the arrival of their newborn foals around the time they know to be online. For example, if you cover a mare at 00:07, the mare will go into labour at 16:07 and the foal will be born at 16:30. Premium players can easily check the covering time in their Foal Calendar.
¶ Trivia
¶ Twin Pregnancy
Twin pregnancies on Horse Reality are currently disabled.[1] Previously they were extremely rare and very buggy. They will get reworked in the future, but at the moment, more critical game features are being worked on.
In the past, in 1 of 10.000 cases, a Horse Reality mare would carry two embryos instead of just one. At the time, the game handled twin pregnancies like two simultaneous pregnancies, meaning that each potential pregnancy had the above risks of failure or miscarriage. Even if both foals were carried to term, they were not necessarily born on the same day.
¶ Changelog
- On December 14th 2018, a bugfix regarding stud fees was implemented[2]
- On January 4th 2019, a small bugfix was implemented[3]
- On June 19th 2019, a small bugfix was implemented[4]
- On February 28th 2024, a small bugfix ad QoL change were implemented[5]
- On May 8th 2024, an issue related to dying horses preventing breeding when not over capacity, was fixed[6]
¶ References
- https://v2.horsereality.com/news/105/game-update-namib-desert-horses-african-wildlife-park-opened-new-city-map-horse-notes-bug-fixes
- https://www.horsereality.com/forum/topic_3143/tuesday-december-4th-2018
- https://www.horsereality.com/forum/topic_4235/friday-january-4th-2019
- https://www.horsereality.com/forum/topic_10902/update-speed-optimisation-qol-changes-and-30-day-logins
- https://v2.horsereality.com/news/156/release-notes-minor-breeding-improvements-code-cleanup-and-a-bug-fix
- https://v2.horsereality.com/news/165/release-notes-bug-fixes-and-clean-ups