Editor's Note: The following was received from the Tennessee Walking Horse Breeders' & Exhibitors Association on Thursday, October 6, 2011.


Attention all Tennessee Walking Horse Owners:

The TWHBEA Executive Committee has unanimously voted on some registry rule changes that go into effect immediately:

    1.  After December 31, 2012 TWHBEA will no longer offer blood typing conversions as part of 
         their registry rules.

    2.  All outstanding blood typing kits or conversion kits will expire December 31, 2012 and will     
         no longer be accepted for processing. TWHBEA will offer a list of lab(s) that do blood conversions
         for parentage verifications but will no longer negotiate a reduced price for members or offer this
         service as part of TWHBEA contracted services. After December 31, 2012, conversions that are
         done by TWHBEA recognized lab(s) that prove parentage as verified by TWHBEA contracted lab(s)
         will be accepted for the registration of folas. As with any registered Tennessee Walking Horse,
         parentage must be verified before registration will be granted.


All parentage verification kits that are issued after November 04, 2011, will have an expiration date.

The dates shall be as follow:

All outstanding blood kits or conversion kits or those issued from now until 12-01-2012 will expire on 12-31-2012 and will no longer be accepted by our contracted  lab(s) (Univ. of Kentucky) as TWHBEA’s financial responsibility.  Fee for conversions after 12-31-2011 will be the sole financial responsibility of the customer.

All DNA hair kits will expire 18 (eighteen) months after the foal’s birth date.  If the Tennessee Walking Horse seeking registration is over 18 (eighteen) months old, the expiration will be 6 (six) months from the date on the submitted registration form.

All re-test kits will receive a 90 (ninety) day expiration date from the time a re-test kit is created and sent to the owner seeking registration.

Deceased Tennessee Walking Horse blood  typed stallions, from which frozen semen has been collected and stored, may have their frozen semen converted by the University of Kentucky at the same rate as blood conversions ($40.00).  This is a new service available now until 12-31-2012.

Reminder-All Breeding Stallion Reports filed on-line or mailed in to the Registry office are due by October 15, 2012.