The Malabar Preservation Group is a network of owners and breeders dedicated to preserving and promoting the wonderful Arabian dynasty that Dr. Ruth Schmidt founded in the 1950's and continually refined for the rest of her life. The Malabar Farm herd became the largest group of linebred prepotent Classic Black Arabian Horses in the world, developed on a genetic basis for over 30 years.

Dr. Schmidt based her breeding program on:
1. Good legs, good pasterns, good shoulders
2. The Classic Arabian Type -- the chiseled head with jibbah, the short back, the natural high tail carriage
3. Size--her mares were 14.3 - 15.2 hands, her stallions 15 - 16.1 hands. She reasoned that men, and most women, today need a larger horse than the 14 - 14.2 hand Arabian of the past
4. Black
5. Intelligence and beautiful disposition. She bred for horses that wanted to "live in your tent", intelligence and disposition being very important, inherited qualities. Dr. Schmidt strove for Arabians "capable of doing anything a horse can do, limited only by the intelligence of the owner."

Dr. Schmidt did not subscribe to the "Egyptian", "Polish", "English", or other so-called Arabian types, believing that the Polish, English, and all other foundation type stock came originally from the Arabian Peninsula and Egypt and were the same as the horses depicted on the walls of the tombs of 3000 years ago. She believed we did not need to import any more Arabians, but needed to breed our horses with more care, using scientific principles to breed first of all sound horses, Arabian in type, with a little more size--producing Arabians as the saying goes "for all seasons." She used three generations of domestic breeding in developing her linebred, prepotent Classic Black Arabians, concentrating on the early Egyptian Arabians inported by Henry Babson and the foundation stock imported by the Crabbet-Maynesboro-Kellogg breeders. She used no recent imports in her program, preferring to mix and match the foundation lines to develop the ideal type of Arabian for today's purposes.

Dr. Schmidt succeeded wonderfully in her breeding goals. The Malabar horses are quiet, laid-back family-oriented horses with excellent conformation who remain sound. They are intelligent beautiful movers who epitomize versatilty. Once you have owned a Malabar, you will never want anything else!

If you own, breed, or have been involved with the Malabar Arabians, we invite you to join the Malabar Preservation Group! There is no cost. We want to make our wonderful horses accessible to everyone! Email: malabar@arabs-iowa.com