Horse Breeding, Stabling and Training Services at YL Ranch

YL Facilities, Training Services, Breeding Services, Fees & Policies

Ranch Facilities:

YL Ranch is a large equine facility which includes a 150’ x 200’ enclosed stall barn encompassing an 100’ x 200’ indoor arena with aluminum bleachers, a concession stand and large electronic scoreboard for timed events such as Team Sortings/Pennings, NCHA/IACHA Cutting competitions, clinics, etc. Within the large barn structure is a Staff-Client reception room and coffee bar, attractive barn apartment with a bedside window looking into an oversized foaling stall and additional 12’ x 12’ stalls with adjoining 50’ runs. When the main barn plan was being designed, we asked our veterinarian to sketch what he would want if he built a new professional clinic for himself, and his suggestions were followed for YL’s clinic. Thanks to his ideas, our clinic area is very functional and certainly appreciated by any veterinarians who have ever performed services for us. The barn also includes a separate Trophy Room where all the “show plunder” and show tack are securely housed, and a large area reserved for feed, hay, shavings, feed tractor, etc. Overhead and first floor storerooms are also handy and appreciated, plus there are additional outdoor arenas, a round pen, bathing/grooming areas, hot walker, and another separate secure outdoor working-tack building convenient to the round pen and indoor arena. As I’ve shared with visitors and clients who admire and compliment our equine facility, it’s not “fancy,” but it is most definitely functional, which is the most important thing.

Just outside YL’s fully equipped breeding and research lab is a well-designed breeding shed area under roof with necessary teasing stocks for the mares and a breeding mount for the stallions standing at stud. YL Ranch is a USDA inspected and approved facility that conducts research in association with professors at Texas Tech University. This includes such projects as targeting and immobilizing sperm carrying the HYPP gene for the reduction of inheritance frequency. Our lab is furnished with all the necessary equipment to handle such research as well as containing all equipment utilized for breeding purposes; i.e., artificial insemination, cooled transported semen, frozen semen, and embryo transfer services.

Three additional barns are on the premises, and a fifth barn designed strictly to house both YL and client stallions standing at stud will be completed for utilization during the 2004 breeding season.

One existing stall barn has open sides for ventilation containing 12’ x 50’ stall/runs for stallions and/or Show Horses which protects them from sun-bleached coats while allowing them access to a more “outdoor” environment and open space. Two other similar type barns providing a total of 40 additional stalls are also available and primarily utilized during competition events held at the ranch or for pasture broodmares confined overnight (under lights) prior to Breeding Season each year. Numerous pasture-sized paddocks feature Centaur fencing for safety, and all pens and paddocks are equipped with large enclosed sheds for adequate shelter from the elements.

Training Services Offered:

“Outside” horses are not routinely accepted by YL Ranch for training, but all clients who have either purchased a horse from us or bred their mare to a YL stallion are automatically eligible to have a horse trained here, request riding lessons, etc., if desired. Anna Warren is YL’s experienced Trainer (see our “YL Staff” page) and our standard fee is $500.00 per month, which includes both Board & Training. When time permits, exceptions are made for acceptance of outside horses. However, our Breeding Seasons at YL Ranch are “labor-intensive,” and acceptance of outside client horses for training is generally accepted only during the months of July through December. Please contact owner, Sharon O. Matthews, regarding details for scheduling.

Breeding Services Offered:

YL Ranch stands stallions-at-stud for outside clients as well as a few of our own, and our highly trained Breeding Staff technicians, Ranch Manager Clay Dehn and Anna Warren, are certified to collect, evaluate, and ship both cooled transported semen and frozen semen as well as to breed onsite mares by artificial insemination. (No live-cover breeding is done at YL Ranch.) Clay Dehn is in charge of YL’s embryo transfer services as well.

Of great importance to both YL Ranch and our clients, we are extremely pleased to share the exciting news that in November, 2003, our facility was granted exclusive license to utilize a unique freezing technology (UFT) which promises to revolutionize the current industry standard of processing frozen equine semen. You may review details regarding UFT by clicking on:

Unique Freezing Technology (UFT)

Of equal importance to stallion owners, YL Ranch is offering a limited time introductory UFT Test Freeze at the reduced rate (half-price) of only $250.00 during 2004. (Test Freeze appointment scheduling is preferred before March 2004, if possible.) Mobile Test Freezes may be arranged. YL Ranch also provides permanent storage and management services for frozen semen samples.

Additionally, YL’s Ranch Manager, Clay Dehn, is actively involved in various equine research projects in association with professors at Texas Tech University, Clay’s alma mater. (Visit our “Staff” page to view an itemized list of current and upcoming research Clay will be focused on.) Many of our AQHA friends and clients will be especially interested in the HYPP issues!

Our much admired and appreciated attending Veterinarian, Dr. Randy Lewis (pictured at left), oversees our breeding operation and has proven to be an excellent equine diagnostician and reproduction expert. Rather than identifying where this skilled and likable Professional and his attractive wife, Kim (also a DVM), accomplished their training, we’ll let you try and figure that out from this photo with their young son, “Gates.” The Drs. Lewis also have a baby daughter, “Brazos,” not quite old enough to understand or illustrate a thumbs-up for her parents' alma mater.

Fee Schedules, Misc. Breeding Services, Contracts & Policies:

Please contact Clay Dehn, Ranch Manager, at (325) 762-3677 or Sharon O. Matthews, Owner, at 325-762-2833 (or if busy 325-762-3412) regarding YL specific service fees for onsite insemination, cooled transported semen, frozen semen, embryo transfer and/or for standing client stallions-at-stud on our premises.

You may conveniently download YL Service and miscellaneous Breeding Contracts from our website for:

2005 Breeding Season Fee Schedule:

1. 2005 Fee Schedule

Stallion Management Services:

1. Stallion Management

Fresh/Cooled/Shipped Semen Services:

1. On-site Insemination
2. Cooled Transported Semen

Frozen Semen Services:

1. Equine Semen Cryopreservation: Test Freeze
2. Equine Semen Cryopreservation: Production Freeze
3. Frozen Semen Storage
4. Frozen Semen Shipment
5. Frozen Semen On-site Insemination

Embryo Transfer Services:

1. Embryo Transfer
2. Recipient Mare Lease
3. Recipient Mare Purchase

Online PayPal Payments:

We accept credit card and e-check payments made online through PayPal.  PayPal is fast, free, secure and requires no account to use.  You only need fill in the agreed upon amount as per the contract, enter your credit card and associated info and you're done.  Please click on the button below to get started.

NOTE: There are NO exceptions to the following YL Ranch policy rule:

Breeding Fees must be paid in full before onsite mares will be Inseminated, and requested semen shipments (cooled or frozen) will not be collected or shipped until said Breeding Fee has been paid in full!

Owners of the client stallions we stand-at-stud may have differing stipulations regarding their Contracts and/or policies with respect to rebreeds, substitution of mares, live-foal guarantees, private-treaty multiple-mare discounts, etc. Any such “personal” stipulations agreed upon between clients who stand stallions at YL and mare owners who purchase breedings from them will be between those individual parties based on their personal negotiations. Any verbal agreements or revisions made between the stallion and mare owners with respect to YL Breeding Contracts must be submitted to Sharon O. Matthews, and YL Ranch will be guided only by the decisions the stallion owners advise us of in writing with regard to such revisions and/or negotiated fee issues.

Boarding Fees & Management Requirements for Onsite Mares:

Boarding fees for on-premise mares are $8.00 per day for dry mares and $10.00 per day for wet mares. Chute (artificial insemination) Fees are $150.00 per heat cycle, regardless of the number of times within that cycle the mare is required to be inseminated. Mares must be halter-broke and manageable in the Breeding Stocks. Foals arriving with their dams should preferably be halter-broke and capable of being led prior to arrival. ALL MARES must arrive with a Negative Coggins pulled within the last six months as well as an itemized list of the vaccinations they have been given and the dates the injections were administered. Please also provide a worming record.

Any mares or foals arriving with a nasal discharge or visibly noticeable illness will not be accepted nor allowed to be unloaded on YL premises. Also, client mares arriving at YL to be bred who have not been pre-checked for breeding soundness (infections, fluid in the uterus, poor uterine tone, etc.), within “days” prior to their arrival, will be required to have a diagnostic ultrasound performed at our facility shortly after arriving. Such exams are also mandatory during a mare’s heat cycle and will increase our odds of getting your mare in foal and substantially decreasing your overall expense during the process! Veterinary expenses are “shared” among clients for diagnostic ranch calls if more than one horse is involved, and all “individual” veterinary expense will be billed to that client directly by the veterinarian as will any necessary farrier services, etc., required for their mare/s or foal/s while boarding at YL Ranch.

Expenses Incurred Using Cooled Transported Semen:

Cooled Transported Semen fees are $175.00 per shipment, which includes two packets of semen per container. A refundable Equitainer Deposit of $250.00 is also required to be paid in advance, which is returned to the client when the mare is checked in foal, provided the container and all internal parts are returned undamaged and intact. (Should any replacements be required, the cost of same will be deducted from the Equitainer deposit and the remaining balance will be refunded.)

If additional shipments of cooled semen are required during the same heat cycle, the charge for that second shipment will be reduced to only $100.00. If the mare fails to conceive and additional semen is ordered during the next heat cycle, the cost of that shipment will revert back to the original $175.00 fee, and a second shipment, if necessary, would again revert back to $100.00.

FedEx Services for both Cooled & Frozen Semen Shipments:

NOTE: Under no circumstances will YL ever ship semen to any client who has not paid their Breeding Fee in full prior to requesting a semen shipment….absolutely no exceptions!

FedEx charges for shipments are the responsibility of the client, and we must be provided a Credit Card or FedEx account number in advance of a requested shipment for that purpose (refer to your Contract). These charges cannot be paid in advance utilizing our “PayPal” program since FedEx charges will vary based on your location and/or the day of the week and time of day the delivery will be scheduled.

FedEx picks up semen shipments at YL Ranch throughout the week and on Saturdays, but might not offer Saturday deliveries to your area. Also, there are no “counter-to-counter” arrangements available at YL’s nearest airport facility in Abilene, Texas, which is a 60 mile round-trip from the Ranch.