General Pedigree Questions
Q:Why can't I find a specific horse?
A: Make sure
that you've spelled the horse's name correctly. That includes all spaces.
If you are confident you have spelled the name correctly and you
still don't see the horse, it probably isn't in our database and you'll
need to
add the
horse
in order
to view its pedigree. Note that even if you add a horse, it may take up to
24 hours for
the horse to show up in some of the queries, in others the addition is
instant.
Please note that the database isn't necessarily complete either.
We don't have every horse ever foaled, only those that have been added to
our database by our users.
Q:What kind of horses are listed in
PedigreeQuery.com's database?
A: The database has been patched together from a number of sources
and it has become the largest free online database of thoroughbred
pedigrees.
The majority of
recent horses (born after 1990) were added from entry data at various U.S.
tracks. Much of the
older data for horses before 1990 comes from two different sources. Albin
Warth was kind enough to donate a database consisting of 180,000
horses to us in 1999 and that database was
combined with our own 60,000 horse database to create a database of
around 220,000 horses. Combining the two databases was a difficult process
due to Albin's use of roman numerals to deal with duplicate
names. As a result, all roman numerals after horse's
names have been removed. This explains why some famous horses such as
Nijinsky II show up in the database as Nijinsky.
The remaining horses have been added to the database by the public. In
March 2000 Del Mar opened it's pedigree database completely to the public
making it very easy to add/edit horses in the database. The result has
been very positive and our database is becoming more complete every day.
We have hundreds of thousands of horses in the databas and more are being
added each day by
the public.
The database also main contain errors and we will not
guarantee the accuracy of any information obtained from the Del Mar
pedigree query. If you spot an error, we strongly urge you to correct
it. If you don't know the
correct information, deleting wrong information is better than leaving
incorrect information. To help us spot errors it's also urged that you
include year of birth (or approximate year of birth) for all additions.
This makes it much easier for us to spot problems in the database and
correct them.
Q: Why do some horse names have numbers at the end of
them?
A: To deal with duplicate names the database uses numbers at the end
of each horse. For instance
Cigar and Cigar2. Sometimes the numbers are removed from
the names before being displayed,
but not always. As a result, sometimes you see the numbers after names. We
feel it's a better method that
using Albin's old roman numeral system.
Q: How do I add a photo for a specific horse?
A: There are two ways. You can either upload a photo (as long as you have
copyright to the photo), or you can link to a photo on another web server (if you
have permission to link). For either method, bring up a horse's pedigree, select
"Edit Information" from the "Maintenence Menu", and find the "Picture URL" field in the data edit screen.
If you have a subscription and are logged in, you will also see an "Upload Photo" button next to the Picture URL box.
Simply supply the full URL to the picture on another server, or click the button to upload your own photo.
Q: How do I get progeny results for dams?
A: The progeny query works for both males and females. If you don't
like the format of the progeny query, then try a 1 generation female
family query instead.
Q: What's the Female Family Query and how does it
work?
A: The female family query can be used to obtain the female family for the
horse in question. If you run a 1 generation query you'll get back a list
of the offspring for
the horse in question if it's a female. When you move up to two
generations you'll get back a
family listing of the horse's 1st dam. When you increase to three
generations you'll get the
family of the 2nd dam and so on. Generally speaking you shouldn't need to
go beyond 4
generations.
Q: What's the Common Ancestor's Query and how does it
work?
A: The common ancestors query will let you find all horses in our database
that share two common ancestors. As an example, try
running the 2 generation common ancestors query for Mr Prospector and Seattle Slew
.
What you'll get back is a list of all the horses who have both Seattle
Slew
and Mr Prospector within the first 2 generations of their pedigrees. If
you refine
the query to 3 generations the list will include those horses who
have the two horses within 3 generations.
It
usually works better for older horses, horses who don't have any offspring
can't appear in other horses pedigrees. You also shouldn't run this query
on two horses who are closely related. If you ran the query on Mr.
Prospector and his father Raise A Native all you would get back is a list
of Mr. Prospector and his offspring. The list would be huge and
unorganized which is why I'd suggest using the other queries for close
relatives.
The query is still under construction and within the next couple days,
I plan to expand on this query to allow you to filter out horses of a
certain sex and horses who have particular
sires in their pedigrees. It also needs to
print more information
about each of the horses returned. For the moment the query lacks these
and other features that it will have when fully completed.
Q: What are the inbreeding statistics and linebreeding
reports?
A: The pedigree query will give complete inbreeding statistics for
the number of generations you are currently viewing. The notation such as
4S x 5D
lets you know the generation and location in the pedigree that the inbred
horse appears. 4S means that the horse appears on in the 4th generation on
the sires half of the pedigree. 5D means in the 5th generation
on the dam's half of the pedigree.
Each inbred ancestor is assigned a random color so that you can easily
locate the pairs in the pedigree. This is useful for 5 or 6 generation
pedigrees. Beyond 6 generations, the color coding is
pretty useless because of all the inbreeding that usually occurs. If two
colors appear the same, it's totally coincidental and you can get a new
set of random colors by reloading the pedigree.
Also remember, pink squares are used for females and blue squares
for males.
Sometimes you'll also see a lower case 'd' or 's'. This means that the
inbreeding is occuring through a female ancestor. An uppercase letter
denotes that the inbreeding is occuring through a male ancestor.
Q: What are the Conduit Mare Profiles?
A:
Bill Lathrop's Modern Conduit Mare Profiles are included in our pedigrees. His system is
similar to Steve Roman's Dosage indexes in that it attempts to measure speed and stamina
influences in a pedigree. However, it differs from Roman's approach in that it
uses female families rather than influential sires to analyze the
pedigree. Bill publishes a book about the subject if you want to learn more about it. The conduit
profiles will appear below the pedigrees for subscribers to the site only.
Q: The font is so small, I can barely read the
pedigree.
A: If you find that the font size for the pedigree displays is too small, use
the Preferences
option to change your desired font size. We
recommend 10pt if you find the font too small. You can also change the
font size by scrolling
down and editing your pedigree display settings. We recommend using the
preferences option since
that will be a permanent rather than a temporary fix.
Q: What are the numbers on top of each pedigree?
A: The numbers you see on top of each pedigree dispaly are related
to Steve Roman's Dosage system. For more information about the dosage
system see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dosage_Index.
This explains how dosage is calculated and what the various numbers
mean.
Q: What are the numbers and letters on the far right of
each pedigree?
A: The numbers such as 3-a or A1 are female family numbers. For more about
female families, I'd suggest taking a look around the Thoroughbred Bloodlines web site.
They have a special section on family numbers.
Q: What do the green stars in the pedigree displays
mean.
A: The green stars are used to denote Reine's-De-Course mares.
"Reine-De-Course" is French
for "Queen of the Turf". Ellen Parker has done an incredible amount of
research on
infuential mares in thoroughbred pedigrees and every so often, she does a
write up on
a new mare and designates a new Reine-De-Course.
Q: What do the red stars mean?
A: The Red Stars (*) are used in the
pedigrees to show that there's a photo for a specific horse on record. To
view the photo of that horse, pull up his or her pedigree and scroll down
untill you get to the Additional Information section of the pedigree.
Q: Why are some horses black and others
blue?
A: Horses whose names are in black type are stakes winners or stakes
placed. A horse who is bold and black is one who has one a Grade I race.
For older horses who weren't born when there were Grade I races, the bold
black type is used to denote horses who won important races in their
day...or Grade I equivilents.
Q: Explain how the X-Factor feature works.
A: The X-factor is a theory developed by Marianna Haun that attempts to
genetically
explain large hearts in thoroughbred race horses. It's pretty complicated
and rather
than trying to explain how it works, I'd suggest buying Marianna's two
books:
The
X-Factor: What is it & how to find it
and
Understand the power of the X-Factor.
If you turn this option on when running a horse query, you should see red
and blue lines in the pedigree
tracing the X-factor gene. Red lines are used to denote single copy horses
and blue lines are used for double
copy horses. Note that some horses may appear with the X-factor in one
pedigree and not in the other. This is
because horses that aren't in an X-chromosome passing position cannot pass
on the X-factor gene and as a result,
they aren't shown. To see where the X-chromosome positions are, click the
X-chromsome option on the upper right
hand side of the pedigree.
If you do not see the red or blue lines at all, it's probably because you
are using an older web browser. This
feature is only supported for newer web browsers. The solution is to
update and get a newer browser. The most
recent versions of Netscape and Internet Explorer will work.
Adding/Editing Horses
Q: There's a hole in a pedigree or a horse that I
need added? Who can I ask
for help?
A: You can hit the "Research" link where the hole appears to have a specific
horse's pedigree researched. We have a small team of people who can look
up pedigree information. When a horse gets added to the Research Request
list, it'll show up on the Research
Requests page where it'll stay until it gets completed or a week
passes and the request hasn't been handled. Generally, it only takes a
couple days for requested horses to be added to the database.
Q: What type of horses are okay to add?
A: The Pedigree query was designed to allow people to access
Thoroughbred
pedigrees for horses from around the world. While the system will
technically allow you to add other breed's of horses, we'd appreciate it
if you didn't add Quarter Horses or other breeds. Adding such horses
spoils the intent and purpose of our database. To help people out who have
horses from other breeds, we've created a separate Allbreed database.
If you are interested in using the online pedigree software we've
developed for additional breeds or types of animals and would like to
fund a separate database, please contact us. The software
may be licensed and we can be hired to design and develop a similar pedigree
database for purposes other than thoroughbred racing.
Q: I added a horse but selected the wrong parents, can you
fix
the error
for me?
A:
Please see the question below about editing the record for a specific
horse. If you do send me an e-mail with the above problem, I'm not going
to correct the error. Instead I will make you correct it on your own so
that you'll know how to deal with the problem on your own the next time
it happens.
Q: I added a horse, but made a typo in its name, now I
can't change it.
A:
You can't edit a horse's name once it's in our database. What you need to
do in this case is add another horse with the correct name and then edit
any offspring's pedigrees so that they point to the record of the
horse with the correct name. Then it would be appreciated if you delete
the incorrect horse from the database.
Q: How do I edit the record for a specific
horse?
A:
To edit the record for a specific horse, first pull up the 4 or 5
generation pedigree of the
horse you'd like to edit. Next find and click the "I want to correct the
listing or add more information"
button below the pedigree and above the inbreeding display. You should
then be allowed to edit the
record of that horse. Fill in the correct fields and then you'll be given
a chance to select the correct
parents.