Blue Mesa Horse Breeding Program

My introduction to Spanish horses was in 1980, when I brokered the sale of a Spanish bred horse for Tom and Linda Hoyt, Stonewall Acres, Albuquerque, New Mexico.  A native New Mexican, I was living in Los Angeles, California and longing for the blue skies of the southwest.   Little did I know that the sale of that single horse would begin my lifelong love affair with a strain of horse, their country, and the people who bred them, and would result in my return to New Mexico.
 
T he Hoyts were so enamored of the filly that they were inspired to take their first of what would be many trips to Spain. Their trip was followed by an invitation for me to return from California to New Mexico to train their horses and to begin their Spanish breeding program. 

O n this first trip, we imported two young stallions, one by the military stallion, Kabioto, and the other, by Guadalcacin. We also leased two mares from Lisa Goodwin of Mallorca, Spain. They were *SZ Pajarilla and *SZED Halime. 

*SZED Halime was a Mizar daughter out of Hagia, who was out of Urga and by Zancudo. For us she produced the *El Moraduke daughter, SA Movida and two *Delerio daughters, Daphne SSB and Deltita.  SA Movida was used in a Trakhaner breeding program and was approved as a foundation breeding stock mare in the Trakhaner stud book. 

T he second trip to Spain resulted in the purchase, from the Yeguada Militar, of Garpa, a full sister to Bambu, and Tajea, a Dandi II daughter. We also purchased Fatima, *El Moraduke’s mother, from the Domecq’s. Garpa was in foal to Jacio. Fatima was in foal to Al Jauf, a Spanish National Champion Stallion by Galero. *Bint Garpa and *Bint Fatima were the resulting foals. Tajea died before we were able to get a foal from her. Arrangements were also made for the purchase of the next foal out of Hezina, a numerous time Spanish National Champion Mare. That resulting foal was named Don Diego (by Galero) and he spent the major part of his life as herd sire for Gerald Watson, Send Court Spanish Arabians, in the United Kingdom. 

B y the time we were ready to import Don Diego, we had many Galero daughters and granddaughters and there were numerous Galero sons already standing in the United States so it was decided that a Galero son was not going to work for us. More on that later. 

The third trip resulted in the purchase of the Galero daughter, Orla II, and her yearling filly, *Laila. Orla II was the Reserve World Champion Mare and European Champion Mare at the Salon du Cheval in Paris. She was sent to the Ybarra stud to be bred to Urif and the resulting filly was *Carla SSB.  Orla II was eventually sold to Send Court Spanish Arabians in the U.K. and produced several foals for them. 
 

*Carla SSB had a spectacular show career for me, winning numerous Snaffle Bit Futurities, including the National Champion IAHA Snaffle Bit Western Pleasure Futurity.  She also won many Regional Western Pleasure Championships, taking time off occasionally to a produce a foal. She was bred only to *Delerio.  She produced Gonzalo, Delores, Carina Ines and Chama Rio.

I sold *Carla to Bobby Unser, Jr. and Schanen Yates Unser in 1998. Sadly, she died after complications from an operation during the summer of 1999. It was only a few weeks after the passing of her dam, Orla II, in England.  Unser Spanish Arabians has replaced her with her daughter Carina Ines. 
 

I still own Delores and she is one of my favorite mares.  Her Allionce colt, Alcapulco Joe, has been a Region VIII IAHA Sweepstakes Gelding and won the 2002 Zia Classic Snaffle Bit Hunter Pleasure Futurity/Maturity, as well as being a blue ribbon winner in Scottsdale and a U.S. National Top Ten Show Hack. Delores produced the *Val Pacha filly Clara II in 2005 and will be bred to Yo in 2008.

I returned to Spain to purchase Jaffar, who was then bred to the Galero son, Motamid. That resulting foal was *La Linda SSB. She has always been the bridesmaid to *Carla SSB, but is an outstanding broodmare in her own right.  She has had two foals by *Delerio, a gelding, Sabio SSB, and a mare, Delmonica.
 
 

Her first partbred gelding, Pick Up Your Toys, creates the visual excitement I desire in my horses.  I sold him as a two year old and he began his training with my brother, Bill Porcher, who is a two-time Western Pleasure trainer of the Year. At at the Cal-Bred Futurities he was Reserve Champion Western Pleasure H/A Futurity, at the 1999 US National Championships he was pinned Top Ten, and at Scottsdale 2000 he was Top Ten H/A Western Pleasure Junior Horse. He is now being shown as a Hunter Pleasure horse and has numerous Regional wins to his credit.

*La Linda SSB produced two other females who have been excellent producers in their own right.  Her daughter, Alika, has had several foals but her two colts by *Val Pacha have proven to be the best nick for her and we are excited to begin showing these two outstanding young horses.  Her other outcross daughter, Eci’ja, is also producing champion stock.  She is the dam of Flaming Desyre, a Regional Champion Working Hunter, and Flames Enchantment AA, also a champion halter horse and just beginning her performance career.

I had to sell her soon after importation, but was able to buy her back a few years later. I bred her to U.S. Top Ten and South African National Champion Stallion *El Nahr HCF.  That resulting filly is Limosa.  *Merbat died while carrying her next foal and, unfortunately, before she had a pure Spanish foal for Blue Mesa Horse.

There were several other mares and fillies imported and many  purchases made in the United States. One of the most important was the French import *Pella. She was a large mare with extreme type. She was bred to National Champion Strike and then to *Makorr. Her *Makorr foal was the IAHA National Futurity Hunter Pleasure Champion, U.S. Top Ten Hunter Pleasure, Canadian Top Ten Show Hack, and numerous time Champion Hunter Pleasure horse, Antiquera I.

We didn’t breed any of our pure Spanish mares to either of the first two stallions we brought over. They were both wonderful show horses, won many halter and performance championships, and did a nice job on domestic and Egyptian mares, but we needed a stallion of equal quality to the mares we had accumulated.  In the meantime we used the services of the Galero son *El Moraduke. 

S o off I took for Spain again, with a side trip to the Netherlands to check on the now three-year-old Don Diego, who was being boarded and treated for piroplasmosis at the Melissa Stud. He was a typey stallion, but lacked the shoulder and had the rear angulation and light hocks from his dam that I didn’t want to introduce into our horses. Hence, the search for a stallion was on, and off to Spain I continued. 
As stated before, we were acquiring quite a few Galero daughters and granddaughters and I had never been very impressed with any of the double Galero-bred stock I had seen so I wanted a stallion that was bred a little differently. I knew I couldn’t find what I was looking for in the Jacio lineage even though he was a very popular stallion in Spain at that time. Garbo would have been okay and so would Dandi II, but the horse I was most interested in was Bambu. 

Bambu was the sire of *Abha Hamir, Spanish National Champion Mare, Scottsdale Champion Mare, Canadian National Champion Mare, U.S. National Champion Mare and U.S. National Champion Pleasure Driving Horse. 

*Abha Hamir was one of the most beautiful mares I had ever seen and an added incentive was we owned Garpa, a full sister to Bambu.  I had seen Ocalina, their dam, at the Yeguada Militar. She had produced 18 foals in her lifetime and was the "grande dame" at the broodmare farm, living well into her 30’s, quite an accomplishment for a broodmare in Spain. Besides this obviously very fertile reproduction system, one of the most consistent attributes of that line was long thin necks. Well aware heavy necks were one of our pure Spanish horses’ biggest drawbacks in American eyes, I wanted to try to find a line that was genotypically as elegant as possible. 

I looked at many colts all over southern Spain and every Bambu son three years and younger. Several were close to what I was looking for, but I had about resigned myself to going home empty handed. 
However, there was one colt left to see. He was by Bambu and out of a Dandi II daughter. He was bred by a small stud in Granada and, in fact, they only had one broodmare. Probably not worth the trip, but the mare was a Dandi II daughter, had been bred by the military, and since the Dandi II daughters were known as very good producers I decided to take the extra day to go see him. 

U pon arriving at the farm the two riding horses/stallions were paraded around. Both were out of the Dandi II daughter and were very nice. I was beginning to get excited because their sire was, in my opinion, somewhat obscurely bred and if she could do that with him then the foal by Bambu might be just short of spectacular. 
When they brought out the yearling colt, I instantly knew he was the horse I was looking for. Big, beautiful eyes, long, upright, elegant neck, level topline, a high straight tail carriage and a calm, assured demeanor. He was exactly the right horse to cross with our mares. His name is *Delerio. Twenty years later, he was still in my care and from showring to breeding shed he had never let me down. 

I came home and told Tom and Linda that I had found just the horse and that he should be easy to purchase, since the owner only had one mare and she was the colt’s mother. I was certainly wrong on that assumption. 
Gonzalo Moreno Abril, owner of Alitaje and breeder of *Delerio, and his family have become dear friends over the years. I have stayed at their farm outside of Granada for weeks at a time and have enjoyed their gracious hospitality. However, buying a horse from Gonzalo is somewhat similar to, as they say, pulling teeth. His herd has grown to close to 60 head and the family still complains to me that he won’t sell any! He loves them all. 

A nyway, with the discovery of a Bambu son, I returned home and began to build a broodmare band for him. I knew it would take at least a couple of years to get him here so, in the meantime, I wanted to collect as many Galero-bred mares as I could. Realize that normally I would never build a broodmare band around a stallion but, instead, would select a stallion for my broodmare band and, in reality; this was what I was doing.  I knew the type of mare I liked and the type of mare I thought would best throw the kind of foal I wanted to produce. *Delerio was an important factor in the equation but, in my mind, it still went back to a certain type of mare. 

A s fate would have it, *Makorr had been imported from England and was not thriving at his current location. He had broken a leg at age two and it had healed grotesquely, leaving him virtually three-legged.  When he arrived in Albuquerque he was thin and weak. He ate pounds of carrots a day and the farm staff took turns jogging with him for exercise. We built him a special run that had a concrete lip on it so he could rest his bad leg, although he came with a block of wood that he liked to use as a rest.  He would move it around his stall or pen so he could stand and take advantage of the best view.

Unwilling to breed a dummy and unable to live cover, we would collect him from the ground and then inseminate the mares. He got every mare in foal. *Makorr had a strong personality and one of the toughest constitutions of any horse I have ever met.  I have tremendous respect for him both as a sire and as a horse. He simply refused to give up; he let you know what he needed to stay strong and then took it from there. He had his definite likes in people, too. He loved most women, tolerated me, and hated his financial benefactor, Dr. Hoyt (which amused Linda).

While *Makorr was populating the farm with Galero granddaughters, we were off to Spain again to close the deal on *Delerio. Traveling to Madrid for the Spanish National Championship Show, Tom and Linda saw *Delerio for the first time and both instantly agreed that he was the right horse for us. The negotiations began and, of course, Gonzalo did not want to part with him. 

We tried every imaginable ploy, including large sums of money, and Linda even cried in front of Gonzalo, begging him to sell her the horse. That was the method that came closest to working and he agreed to think about a possible lease.  A few months later, Tom and Linda went back to Spain to meet with Gonzalo and finalize the deal. It was agreed that he would lease the horse, and that I was to come back to show him in Switzerland at the World Cup and then at the Spanish Nationals in Jerez.   I went to Spain about a month before the Swiss show to train and condition *Delerio. Spain sent a contingency of horses, about 20 as I recall, including *Delerio. He was the highest scoring colt in the show, but somehow was beaten in the championship, thus being tied Reserve World Champion Junior Colt. 
 

About a month later, I returned to Spain and showed *Delerio at the National Championships. He was named Reserve National Champion Junior Colt and Gonzalo finally agreed to sell him to us. However, Gonzalo first wanted to breed him to some mares—which he didn’t own yet—and the horse had to

We didn’t even breed him that season and began dispersing all but a select few of the broodmares. We had been maintaining a small broodmare band in Spain. All were sold except for Orla II and Jaffar, who were sent to Send Court Spanish Arabians in England. I went back to school to get my degree in Art History and we all took a breather.   But as everyone involved with horses knows, that couldn’t last long. *Carla SSB was three years old and prime for the futurities so she was sent on the road. Tom and I would fly to the shows so I didn’t have to miss classes and *Carla’s groom would haul her. She would win, and we would come home. Simple as that. The first time we took *Carla to a show and hauled other horses with her she was quite insulted as she felt there was really no need to share the spotlight or the carrots. 

*Carla’s winning gave Tom and me the boost we needed to continue, and the next breeding season we bred a few mares to *Delerio. The resulting foals were just what we were hoping for and thus the breeding program was started up again.
 

*Delerio entered the American show ring for the first time and began adding to his European titles. Through his show career he has been Region VIII Top Five Stallion, Region IX Reserve Champion Show Hack, Region VIII Champion Show Hack (twice), U.S. National Top Ten Show Hack and Scottsdale Champion Show Hack.

I was loading to go to the IAHA Futurities in Fort Worth, Texas, interestingly enough on 9/11, when I got the news that Dr. Hoyt, a cardiac surgeon, had been killed in a plane crash while going to retrieve a heart for a transplant. 

O nce again, my world came to a crashing halt. Losing two friends in such a short period of time, and being so involved with them in something that we all three cared so passionately about, was almost more than I could bear. Tom’s estate really left no money for the horses, so once again I began to disperse horses to pay for upkeep.  Tom had remarried to a wonderful woman, Chris, who knew little about horses but did know what they meant to Tom and made every effort to help me in keeping the nucleus of the breeding herd together.

Economics, as with the Spanish breeders and their lack of a market for many years, has played a major role in my breeding operation. I could never afford to keep any but the very best breeding stock and to breed a mare before I had sold the previous crop was a luxury. In a way, it was similar to the severe culling that had been practiced in Spain for 150 years. 

I was eventually able to buy back some of the original mares that had been sold at different times, and placed others with amateur riders so I could keep an eye on them. Over the years I have given a few mares to friends just so I could, at some point, breed from them should I find a particular stallion that I think would cross successfully. These are, of course, *Delerio daughters. 

I am finding that those daughters cross with a great deal of success to just about any quality stallion. They have been so easy to breed from. 

To sum up my breeding program, I would have to say I try to breed athletic horses that excite the eye, that are soft to handle and easy to train.  While I don’t mind a hot horse I want nothing to do with a tough horse. I consider ease of reproduction or fertility to be a main factor in selecting breeding stock and I prefer not to waste a lot of time on a mare with any degree of breeding problems. 

My grandmother had a lot of sayings and two of my favorites are "A good horse is never a bad color" and "A head is just to hang a bridle on." Actually, my favorite saying of hers is "We all grow old; the key is to do it gracefully," but that doesn’t have anything to do with horses.  Most of my horses are grey because I think it is hard enough to breed a good horse without adding the color hurdle and because I love looking at white broodmares out in the pasture.  An old time trainer once told me that “you’ll never have good horses until you learn to look past color”, so I have tried to ignore what color a horse is.  Heads have never been a big issue to me as long as the head is pleasant.  I would like to have extremely typey fine heads on my horses but I am so much more concerned about movement, balance, good bone, and tractability/trainability.

I can’t stand a small-eyed horse.  I want a short-backed horse with good loins and a deep hip. Arabs must have high, natural tail carriages. Horses with low set, flat necks and short polls are difficult to bridle. I want horses with high set necks and long polls.   Having been a professional trainer for over 30 years, I have come to realize that almost all training problems stem from conformation issues so I try to breed horses that are free from structural defects and built to physically do the job I am asking of them. Once again I quote, "Form ever follows function." (I believe I heard that from Gene LaCroix many years ago).  And, as the icing on the cake, I want them to be very, very pretty. Here again, I try to learn from those that came before me and an old and highly respected judge once told me after a class where I had ridden a very pretty mare, “You get 20% for conformation and when you entered the ring you were 20 points ahead of everyone else in the ring.” As anyone knows, a 20 point advantage is a big advantage.

I returned to Spain in 1995 for the first Spanish National Championships since the lifting of the quarantine on el peste. It was held in Aranjez.  In 1996 I made two trips to Spain, one of which included the National Championships in Granada. 

In the summer of 2000, Schanen Yates Unser and I went in search of another stallion.  We began at the Spanish National Championships in Marbella. . . .

back to top
 

In the year 2000 the search for a Classical Spanish stallion to breed to the *Delerio daughters and the other Classical Spanish mares of Blue Mesa Horse and Unser Spanish Arabians) was not going so well.  I tried the international importation of fresh cooled semen from the Spanish and British National Champion Stallion Borneo, but that had not proved to be successful.  Schanen Unser had spent countless hours searching for pure Spanish stallions and had reviewed numerous tapes. There seemed to be no pure Spanish stallions in the United States that would be the right cross for the group of Spanish horses that Dr. Tom and Linda Hoyt had put together beginning in the early 1980’s, and that had been continued by Blue Mesa Horse and Unser Spanish Arabians.

T hen word came that Borneo would be leaving the United Kingdom and that he might be available for lease and importation to the United States.  That prompted Schanen and I to plan a trip to Britain to see the horse in the flesh and to see some of his get show at the British National Championships.  It was discovered that the Spanish National Championships were just a week prior to the British National Championships and it was decided the trip should start in Spain.  Thus, the search for a stallion begin there just in case the Borneo arrangement didn’t work out. A trip to the Spanish Nationals, to be held in Marbella, and visits to various stud farms, including the Yequada Militar in Jerez was planned, and in July of 2000 Schanen and I headed for Europe.

The show in Marbella allowed for an overview of the Spanish horses and arrangements were made to visit selected stud farms.  There was one colt that stood out.  He was bred by Valjuanete and was sired by the Military Stallion Nabat, so a quick side trip was scheduled to Jerez to visit the Military Stud and see this horse prior to seeing his get at Valjuanete.  However, El Juli, the most famous bullfighter in Spain, was fighting in the Marbella ring the afternoon after the show, and Schanen and I felt we couldn’t miss that.  After a wonderful performance where El Juli was awarded both ears and the tail (an extreme honor), we set off for Jerez.  I was driving and Schanen was navigating. We decided that going through Rhondo would be the quickest.  It began to get dark and the road began to get curvy. Then it got narrower, curvier and even darker.  Schanen made the comment, “Jim, you are driving a little deep into your corners”.  I wondered what the heck I was doing driving when there was an Unser in the car! That was remedied the next day when Schanen took over the wheel, until she scared me to death by driving 100+ mph and lighting a cigarette at the same time.

The visit to the Military Stud proved to be very exciting because Nabat, the sire of the colt bred by Valjuanete, was an exquisite horse. He had a long thin neck, beautiful head, correct body structure and a wonderful disposition.  He was lead out of his stall and posed in a stable collar, not glamorous but certainly very revealing.

That evening we visited with the breeder of *Delerio in Granada and then the next day headed for Toledo and Valjuanete.  The invitation to stay at Valjuanete was particularly special because this is the former breeding farm of the Duke of Veragua.  The last direct descendent of Christopher Columbus, the Duke imported into Spain some of the finest horses from around the world.  At one time the broodmare band included five Skowronek daughters the Duke had purchased from Lady Wentworth.

T he next morning a trip to the stables for a view of the horses produced the younger brother of the colt that Valjuanete had shown in Marbella. He was only a weanling but was the spitting image of his brother.  Things were looking up!  Here was a colt that had the right bloodlines, was phenotypically what the Blue Mesa Horse and Unser Spanish Arabians mares needed, and we had been impressed by his sire during our Military Stud visit.

The last stop on this tour was at the Fleur de Lis farm of the Sra. Teresa Laula de Borbon.  I had noticed her horses during a previous trip to Spain and had wanted to see what was available.  She had invited us to lunch, which proved to be most entertaining!  Schanen, as the female guest, was served first.  She turned to see a silver tray being presented to her, upon which appeared to be about two dozen small cooked animals with their appendages still attached. The look on her face and the quick rely of “No thank you!” was cause for many a chuckle through the rest of the trip.

The Fleur de Lis horses were very nice but the decision was made to attempt to purchase the weanling colt that we had seen previously at Valjuanete. That night Schanen and I met with Cristina Valdes and her father in their Madrid apartment to go through the photo albums that dated back to the time of the Duke of Veragua, and to negotiate the purchase of the unnamed weanling colt. A deal was struck and we headed off to England to see Borneo and the British National Championships.

Borneo proved to be a very beautiful stallion and has sired some very typey offspring that did quite well at the show. The setting was in Malvern, near the border of Wales, and the sight of Arabian horses cavorting on that beautiful green showgrounds was quite spectacular. After the show a trip was made to Pendock Stud for me to see some Welsh Mountain Ponies, a recent venture for Blue Mesa Horse. No purchases were made, though a little stud colt aptly named Thuglet did try to talk his way to America.  
 

Champion in Spain

Once back in the U.S., arrangements began  for the importation of *Val Pacha. The reason for purchasing young horses is that, hopefully, they will not be infected with piroplasmosis yet and will not have to go through the very costly CEM testing. As luck would have it, the outbreak of Hoof and Mouth disease in Europe halted all importation, and during this time*Val Pacha contracted piroplasmosis.

Very few horses in Spain are free of piroplasmosis and over the years the breeders have learned how to properly treat for this disease.  In the past, many horses have died during treatment and the breed has lost some wonderful Spanish horses as a result. The National Champion Galero son Al Jauf is one that comes to mind.  *Val Pacha's breeder agreed to one treatment, but if that was not successful she would not treat him again for fear of losing him. He was treated the first time and, unfortunately, did not test negative.  However, Cristina was convinced to treat the colt one more time.  This time the treatment proved successful and the rush was on to get the colt out of Europe before his second birthday and, thus, prior to complications with CEM. He was taken by van to Madrid and then to Amsterdam, loaded on a plane for Los Angeles, quarantined in LA, cleared Customs and shipped to Albuquerque, all in less than a week.  He arrived at Unser Spanish Arabians just a few days prior to his second birthday.

*Val Pacha is short backed and has a high tail carriage as well as a high neck set.  His shoulder is long and well laid back and he has an upper arm and length of humerus that is so lacking in many of the Arabian horses today.  He is a very intelligent horse and considers himself to be at least equal to his human counterparts, although I am sure that, in the back of his mind, he thinks he is superior to some of them.  He has a great work ethic and loves to learn new things and be challenged mentally.  Shown only as a Hunter/Jumper he was won Regional Championships and has been named twice (2006 & 2007) as Arabian Hunter/Jumper Horse of the Year in Region 8.
...

M ost importantly, though, his foals are even more than what we had hoped for.  They are all outstanding movers, and while refined, still retain the substance and quality we want in our horses.  The oldest purebred, Clara II, is a coming three year old and we look forward to her making her show ring debut this year.

Clara II (click to enlarge)

back to top

During a trip to the Stanley Ranch in 2002, I met a mare, Pascion S, who I could not get off my mind.  She embodied everything I coveted in a Spanish mare and her pedigree was exactly one I would chose for a herd sire’s dam.  I kept her in the back of my mind and would call or e-mail Molly Stanley from time to time to check on
Pascion S. 

My mother and stepfather, Barbara and John Hampton, have since signed on as co-owners.

Yo arrived in New Mexico, from Nevada, as a yearling in April, 2004.  Molly and Dave Stanley wanted to make sure he was comfortable with himself and ready to be moved to a new farm before we uprooted him.  He spent the winter with multi-National Champion Jezabel+//; nothing like an older mare to teach a young colt manners.  We are also hoping some of her ability for success in the show ring rubbed off on him as well.

As I mentioned, the main reason behind my selection of Yo was his dam, Pascion S.  As a show horse, she was Grand Champion Mare in the Spanish Futurity all three years shown and was also Grand Champion Mare at the first Pacific Coast Arabian Sport Horse Classic in 1996.  She is also a recognized Field Hunter.  Her dam, *Iberia, is a Canadian National Champion Working Hunter and Molly’s favorite Hunt mare.

Her granddam is the Yeguada Militar mare, Kadofa (Zancudo x Ocalina) and a legend at the Stanley Ranch breeding program.  She is the dam of four imported daughters, all by different sires.  Three are National Champions:  *Jezabel+//, *Galaxia, and *Iberia.  The fourth daughter, *Efigie was a Regional Champion in Driving and Show Hack.

Kadofa’sdam, Ocalina, was a product of the Veragua breeding program and was a very important mare for the Yeguada Militar, especially in the production of daughters and granddaughters who have been outstanding producers and figure in many pedigrees of today’s top winning Spanish Arabians as well as the head breeding stallions at the Yeguada Militar in Jerez de la Frontera. Ocalina was also famous in Spain for producing 23 offspring during her lifetime.

*Delerio’s sire, Bambu, was an Ocalina son, and *Carla SSB’s dam, Orla II, was an Ocalina daughter so Ocalina has been an important mare, or really the cornerstone, of the Spanish horses bred originally by Stonewall Acres and now by Blue Mesa Horse.  Ocalina traces her tail female to the Polish mare, Kadranka, imported by the Spanish Military Commission in 1906.
 

While I put more emphasis on the tail female line and the dam, nonetheless, one can never discount the sire’s importance and in Yo’s case, I don’t think I could have handpicked a better sire for Pascion S to produce a future herd sire.  *SS Orion possesses a pedigree which is a unique combination that can only be produced by the judicious matings within a mature breeding program.  Such is a breeding program of S.A.R. Princesa Teresa de Bourbon, Yeguada Flor de Lis.

When I traveled to Spain in 2000, I went to find a stallion to compliment the *Delerio offspring and the main farm I was interested in visiting was Yeguada Flor de Lis because of seeing Fakateko at the Spanish National Championships in Granada a few years earlier.  At the time, my main interest was a prospective stallion with motion and Flor de Lis did not have the colt we were looking for, finding him, instead, at Valjuanete in *Val Pacha, but it is most interesting that I do find a grandson of Fakateko three years later and not in Spain but in Yerington, Nevada.
 

S.A.R. Princesa Teresa de Bourbon’s foundation mare was the exceptional Tabal daughter Nevisca.  Both *SS Orion’s sire and dam have Nevisca tail female lines. *SS Orion’s dam, Daikiri, is a famous beauty and is a daughter of Supreme Champion Polka.  Daikiri has outstanding movement and a well set and very well shaped neck.

The selection of Yo as a compliment to the offspring of *Delerio and the future get of *Val Pacha was made first and foremost on the outstanding phenotype of his sire and dam, the production ability of his full brother, Tobascco, and the outstanding pedigree which is behind him.  I would like to express my heartfelt thanks to the Stanley Ranch for producing such a colt and my gratitude for entrusting his future into my hands. 

After is arrival, Yo was turned out with geldings and/or stud colts of his age.  No pressure was put on him and his days were spent playing and growing.  At three he was put under saddle but continued to be turned out with his buddies on a regular basis.  Over the winter of his three/four year old year he started getting pretty rough during playtime and we knew he was ready to take on the responsibilities of breeding.  He was bred to a select group of mares and his first foals will arrive in 2008.

His under saddle training had continued all along and he went to his first horse show in the fall of 2007 where he won the Hunter Pleasure Junior Horse class and received a comment from the judge that he was an outstanding moving horse.  His oiliness, drive and reach are truly breathtaking and we feel he is going to be rewarded in the show ring, as he continues his show career, for his rather unique movement.  He has begun his over fences training and is proving to be a natural at those exercises.  The plan is for him to finish out his junior year in the Hunter Pleasure and Sport Horse Under Saddle – Junior Horse – and then he will show over fences as a six year old – a division where we feel he will be a star.

In the meantime, select Thoroughbred and Warmblood/Anglo mares have been acquired for him as I really feel he is going to contribute a great deal to the Sport Horse division in producing a superior Sport Horse because of his intelligence, ease in trainability and athletic prowess – as well as his distinct Arabian type. 
  

home | spanish arabian history | breeding program | stallions | mares | anglo arabian sport horses | welsh/arab ponies | sale hors | links | contact us

Copyright © 1999 Blue Mesa. 
All rights reserved.