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Sunday, August 21, 2011

Featured horse of the week *Daylily WF*


Several years ago Anne decided to give up her riding mare Lily (by Again and Again) and bred her to Dressage Royal. Lily had always been the 'steady Eddie' horse to ride - super soft gaits, kind nature and willing to go the extra mile for her rider in an effort to please. Having been trained up through the FEI levels very quickly was also part of the package that made Lily such a good horse. :) If you were to use the judging scale - Lily was an 9 with her sweetness pushing her very close to a 10! Lily's dam, Teasing Shadow xx, had been bred by a local (and very famous) Thoroughbred family. Shadow was the daughter of a mare that had great sentimental meaning to them and was a sweet mare who traces back to Somethingroyal (Secretariat's dam) on her damline. So in breeding Shadow to Anne's favorite stallion Again and Again in 1990, she had stacked the deck to produce an outstanding individual! When it came time to breed Lily, Anne had chosen Waldaire for her first foal - which resulted in Waterlily WF (2006). So in the spring of 2007 it was time to see what the 'new' stallion would give us.



Dressage Royal needs no introduction. Donnerhall. Rubinstein. Enough said!





The following spring, Lily presented us with her filly. We had decided that all of her fillies would be named with a "lily" as part of their name and we needed a D to start. So Daylily was the easy choice but we needed a nickname for around the barn. One of Anne's students, Karyn, suggested "Stella" as it is the common name for a daylily! And so we had a name for our little bundle of joy!

When little Stella arrived, we were thrilled! A black filly! Hind socks! A snip! A very pretty face! Curly ears! She was gorgeous and just a really funny baby. 99% of the time she was very laid back and the other 1% of the time, you could (and still can) see her decide to be a little naughty - and then she does something a bit silly. As always, if you scold Stella, she is mortified that you caught her being anything less than a perfect lady and reverts back to her 'good' self. Honestly, she just makes us all laugh as you can see her thinking through the process...horses are nothing but pure entertainment sometimes and Stella is a hoot!






At her foal inspection, Stella received huge praise for her conformation, TYPE (very, very feminine) and movement. All of the good marks resulted in a Premier score and we earmarked her as a "keeper" for both the riding and breeding program in the future. After the Inspection Tour came to a close, we were very proud to have our Daylily named Top Foal in North America!


Foal Video



As with all young horses, you watch the special ones grow up and cross your fingers, pray to the god of your choosing that they emerge from their youthful exploits unscathed and then send them off to be started with mixed emotions. Well, Stella had a lovely time at 'Camp Roddy' and returned home in the winter of 2010 a pleasant and easy going undersaddle horse - just like her momma, Lily.



Two year old video



Stella in the fall of 2010.

Stella 30 days undersaddle






So it's late in the summer of 2011, Stella is a fun and easy horse to ride. We will continue to advance her training over the winter and then look for some shows to bring her out in the FEI Young Horse Tests in the spring. You can see a bit of video of her HERE.

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