Friday, November 9, 2012

Amazing News From Breeder

I contacted the breeder via email and was so happy when she called me. I wasn't sure how I would be received. Sometimes people who get horses from the auction can burn bridges by calling past owners. Sometimes horses are dumped and other times there is MUCH more to the story. The breeders website was just updated and the lady seemed so nice and down to earth. She cares deeply for the horses and is very involved with preventing bone disorders in young horses as well as proper conditioning. I wondered if she could possibly be the owner who let him be on the verge of ending up with the kill buyer. Turns out SHE WASN'T!! She had sold him at auction the month before. When she brought him she advertised her nurse mare program and had tons of info on his breeding. She was willing to file paperwork for him to be registered but the person who bought him didn't follow through. She would never have let him end up in the kill pen. She has wondered how he was doing and hoped he was doing well. She was sad to hear he was brought back the next month and THRILLED he has a forever home. She was so genuine in her love for these horses that it made my heart happy and my eyes a little teary. 

The farm runs a cutting edge nurse mare program and TB breeding program. Dickie's mom is one of their best nurse mares. She is actually raising a baby right now. He was the first baby by his daddy Houseofroyalhearts. They feed to prevent OCD from birth. Their horses get dental work starting as yearlings. They all get the best of care regardless of if they are high dollar racehorses or babies from the nurse mares. They also are involved with research in conditioning and returning horses to soundness after injury. I have very mixed feelings about racing but it made me so happy to hear a racehorse breeder so focused on long term soundness of their horses. That means a horse will have a productive second life as a sporthorses after the racing years are over. 

The best we can figure is that the person who bought him turned around and dumped him one month later. He bought him to make a Mexican Dancing Horse out of him. Not sure what that is but he is a handful I can't imagine him having the attention span for anything as a yearling. I suspect he was too much horse so they dumped him. It is an example of someone not thinking what it takes to raise a young horse then dumping him when they get in over their head. 

She had no idea he had a heart murmur and really wanted to know if it was genetic. It isn't so there are no worries on that front. She wants pictures and wants to see how he does over the years. She said that homes like mine are what she wants for horses who come out of the nurse mare program. I can't wait to go up and meet his momma and daddy!!! 

Here is his momma:

Here is baby daddy:

Here is their FB page:

She is hoping people will "like" their FB page. They have an old page started by a friend with tons of important info. Unfortunately that friend passed away so they don't have passwords. Facebook will only let them merge the sites when her new site has more likes than the old one. 

5 comments:

  1. Very cool! I wish I could find out Shy's history a little more, as well as her sire and dam. I have traced her back to the auction she came from, but apparently the person who brought her to the auction had some sort of no contact clause and the auction can't/won't give me his contact info.

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  2. If you have the dates for the auction you can probably get more info. The state agriculture agency keeps all that info. Although if the people don't want to be contacted you might not get far. Howerver sometimes you find out they came in w a foal or another horse that could have been a parent.

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  3. That is so cool how they grafted that baby onto Star!! I didn't know they could do nurse mare programs without the mares actually being pregnant! That's awesome. Wow, Dickie's mom and dad are absolutely gorgeous!! I'm glad you found out more about them. :)

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    1. I am really interested in the whole nurse mare thing now. I never really thought about it before this. I would love to head up and meet the parents. It is funny that they aren't that big. Dad is 15.3. Mom looks decent sized buy allbreedpedigreequery lists her as 15h. Not sure where he got his size.

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    2. Me too! I didn't realize his parents are that short. They look taller lol. I guess he just got some awesome hybrid vigor and outgrew them both LOL!

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