Invitational Show Registration
Username: caf.
Barn: Cavallo Stables
Horse: Fool’s GoldShow Discipline: Hunters
Prompt: #15
Entry: I picked up Jester at an auction during my travels in Virginia. The big boy was a handsome five-year-old gelding at the time, transported into the States from Australia. His sellers had imported and broken him for the express purpose of selling him as an “exotic” horse - after all, brumbies aren’t terribly common here. Of course, they’d done a pretty poor job of backing him - after all, they were on a strict time frame to get him sold - but luckily, he was a gentle thing who responded well, if not particularly quickly, to a regimen of conditioning and retraining.
I’ll probably never know what he was like as a foal, but I’d guess he was a fiery thing. It’s likely at least one of his parents was a Thoroughbred due to his great size, and range colts must have boundless energy with which to explore the plains and mountains. Jester isn’t a dumb horse, but he isn’t particularly quick, either, not like some of my stock - I assume he was very close with his band and perhaps not particularly independent. He is athletic, however, and that must have served him well; I don’t doubt that he was incredibly playful and very well-suited to his environment at the time.
He was captured at age four, so by the time he became a domesticated animal, he was already fully grown and probably very confused and frightened. His youth had already been difficult and tumultuous; sweltering summers, subzero winters, rugged terrain, and a scarcity of food made him hardy and strong but ultimately unprepared for life with people. It was the job of his sellers and, later, me, to convert him into a riding horse. His background still shines through in his surefootedness and ceaseless athleticism; I can only guess at his heritage and past, but he constantly gives me clues. (WC: 312)
Location: Montevideo
Horse: The Winter SeaShow Discipline: Three-Day Eventing
Prompt: #24
Entry: Needless to say, there’s a reason I chose Winter on the sales trip during which I purchased her.
She’s not a terribly large mare, but I quickly found that her breeders did an impeccable job in selecting for excellent action and build while still preserving traits common to nokotas. Winter’s trot isn’t terribly suspensory, perhaps, but it’s very accurate and rhythmic. She has a slight daisy-clip to the gait as well, which is certainly a plus.
Her canter, though, is truly what I bought her for. That already sure-footed, ground-covering gait of most feral horses was refined into a rocking, relaxed movement. It felt beautiful, to say the least.
Granted, when I bought her, she really liked to travel heavily on her forehand, typical of most young horses. Lots of pole work, strength training, and clinics with dressage experts greatly improved her way of going. Still, even though her canter and trot are both attractive and accurate, her walk leaves something to be desired.
Unfortunately, due to her small size, Winter struggles at the lowest gait. Unlike the warmbloods and larger horses I’ve dealt with in the past, she has little “march” and “swing,” so to speak. Using poles has improved it somewhat, but the simple fact is that the walk is the hardest gait to improve. Nowadays she at least tracks up somewhat - her hind feet land about three inches in front of the prints left by her fore-hooves.
The mare still likes to roll onto her forehand if I’m not totally accurate in my contact and seat, but I find that she generally scores very well in dressage if I ride her well. Unfortunately, she never scores very well in movement simply because she can’t physically move the way a well-bred warmblood can. It’s something I sacrificed when I transitioned to training and showing feral horses full-time. Still, for a mare so small, she holds her ground quite well. (WC: 325)
Location: Glasgow
Horse: Moonlit WatersShow Discipline: Three-Day Eventing
Prompt: #31
Entry: My mother raised me as a hardline traditionalist when it came to clothes for horse shows, at least in the English discipline. Perhaps she never planned for me to add the western and driven disciplines to my repertoire, but even so I still tend to dress rather conservatively, even in the western pleasure ring.
I’ve had my wool show coat since age sixteen and have yet to let go of it; it’s a huge pain at summer shows but I’d hate to make a huge investment on a new mesh coat when I have a perfectly functional one already. I always wear a coat for both dressage and stadium jumping - unless the judge has done something to displease me - over a generic starched white shirt. I have a shadbelly at home for dressage showing but I’ve never worn it to an event - I hate it and I’ll take any excuse to wear something else. I have a lace stock tie as well - a gift from a colleague - and a modern pair of white full-seat breeches I reluctantly splurged on after a few clinicians commented on how unprofessional my cheap old ones seemed. White gloves, too, since my black ones aren’t of terribly nice quality.
As for cross-country, I’ve never appreciated the fad of bright, tacky colors. On Moon, I generally wear a simple black short-sleeved shirt with a white undershirt if it’s especially cold out. I usually wear black breeches to prevent ruining my white ones and no helmet cover. I generally wear the black gloves, too, since there’s no need to look especially pretty on cross-country. I haven’t ever purchased an air vest - I’ve never needed one - and I have a plain black body protector I purchased when I outgrew the green child-size one. Spurs simply aren’t necessary for this horse - he’s plenty forward on his own. As such, I simply carry a plain crop when jumping in case of a bad moment. (WC: 332)
Location: Glasgow
Horse: Guadalupe GrooveShow Discipline: Western Pleasure
Prompt: #19
Entry: Comal has always been a pony with a gentle spirit; despite being green and inexperienced he’s a very easy ride. Even his worst spooks amount to a dart to the side and a snort; he’s easy and forgiving both under saddle and in the traces. I’ve yet to find a bad bone in him; he may not be the fanciest pony in the world, but he’s certainly valuable.
If someone offered to buy him later in his life, I wouldn’t complain; I love the horse, sure, but I don’t have any overwhelming attachment to him. If the home and the price were right I’d be happy to see him off to become a child’s pony. That said, I can’t predict how far he’ll go yet - he might well become a very valuable horse if he begins succeeding at the higher levels. If that happens - something I consider somewhat unlikely but nonetheless possible - it’ll likely take an awfully good offer to get me to part with him.
It’s very likely that Comal will retire at my farm when he is finished competing. Ideally I’d like for him to competing until the end of his life; even though he will, of course, retire from invitationals at age 19, hopefully he will continue to compete at schooling shows for a long time to come. Of course, as I know too well, there is always a chance a horse will go lame and be unable to compete; if that’s the case, I hope I can continue to use him in beginner riding lessons.
I have a feeling he’ll make a great lesson pony, and perhaps a low-level student will lease him so that I won’t have to worry about his getting exercised and loved on. Something tells me he’ll be happiest if he continues to be ridden until the end of his life; I’ve never met such a people-horse in my life. (WC: 321)
Location: Brussels
Horse: Fatal Attraction Show Discipline: Western Pleasure
Prompt: #85
Entry: My mother always loved horses; in her younger days she was a low-level event rider. Of course, when she graduated college and married she left the sport, but her heart was still with it. Whether I liked it or not, I was in riding lessons from age six onward, though I rode at a small barn that didn’t show. I was a loud girl then, daring; I found a love for jumping even though I had some success in the western saddle as well.
Mom found the first Cavallo property just before my eighth birthday. It was small, run-down, but it had a six-horse barn and a nice house and, most importantly, it was cheap, since a large, ugly factory had been built right next door. Soon after, she bought a horse; a big, handsome dressage warmblood named Olympus.
I found Olympus to be a boon, even though my riding him mildly terrified my mother. He was as honest as honest could be, which often resulted in my tumbling off of him when he’d clear something any smart horse would have refused. Gentle as a lamb, too, despite his being a stallion; as he grew old I taught many lessons with him on a lunge line. As I grew older I started showing him at low-level events with the help of a local trainer.
Soda was the first horse that my mother and I really agreed was mine; she wanted me to have a horse I could trail ride and care for myself. At the time I was around twelve and had fallen into a depression due to a lot of factors; she probably hoped having my very own horse would lift my spirits. Of course, he turned out to be a nervous disaster when we brought him home - the sellers had lied about how long he’d been off the range - but I loved him all the same. Since then, I’ve been enamored with the feral horses; I haven’t stopped pursuing them since.
I’m now twenty-six, showing virtually all disciplines (though my driving is still admittedly terrible - I generally let students show my harness horses). A lot has changed, but, with a variety of nervous wrecks in my barn, I suppose a lot hasn’t. (WC: 377)
Location: Brussels
Horse: Bright EyesShow Discipline: Reining
Prompt: #6
Entry: Since their purchase, Yarraman, Smokey, and Jester have traveled together in the three-horse trailer. The threesome pastures together along with Comal and Romeo (who travel separately in a two-horse), so they all get along quite nicely. I’ve never once heard them kicking or squabbling back there; on the contrary, whenever we’ve stopped on long trips, I’ve always found them quietly eating and sleeping.
Who is Yarraman’s favorite? That’s a debatable question. To be honest, he seems a bit the third wheel; I often see Smokey and Jester tearing around the pasture, but the kaimanawa’s rarely with them. He, on the contrary, likes to pick on Comal at the hay bale. In the barn, he’s stalled between Jester and Romeo (the entire pasture is stalled right in a line), and I’ve really never seen him have an issue with Jester (though he certainly prefers him to Romeo, who often tries to eat hay out of Yarraman’s bag instead of his own). I’ve never noticed him expressing a specific preference on who he ends up next to in the trailer; as long as he’s not in the last stall, he’s perfectly content. Though, to tell the truth, most of these observations aren’t things I’ve seen myself; I often glean my information on the social lives of the horses from the kids, since I honestly don’t pay that much attention to them.
Ultimately, though, he rides somewhat more often with Smokey; they’re both reining horses, after all, so if the show we’re driving to isn’t multi-disciplinary, we tend to leave Jester at home and slide Cider in with them instead. It’d make sense, then, that Smokey would be his favorite to ride with, though to be honest, Yarraman doesn’t seem picky. He won’t ride alone - I tried that once and only once - but I could put nearly anyone in there with him and he’d fall right asleep. (WC: 316)
Location: Laoag City
Horse: Guadalupe GrooveShow Discipline: Driven Dressage
Prompt: #38
Entry: It’s true; Comal has an ugly head. I honestly have no clue where his big, boxy, Roman-nosed face could have come from, but either way, I wouldn’t consider it his biggest fault. After all, it is unattractive to most judges, but it truly doesn’t hinder him in any way. In fact, a lot of the older lesson students find it somewhat charming.
On the contrary, I find his back to be his worst fault. None of his attributes are particularly bad - he’s not a trainwreck at all - but his topline is just wrong enough that about half of judges comment on it.
It’s certainly improved with work; when I purchased him, he had a horrendous topline with zero back muscling whatsoever. Now that he’s in proper dressage his spine doesn’t jut out so horribly, but his withers are still inappropriately high (which makes him an incredible challenge to fit a saddle to). It’s quite odd, really; his neck is beautifully shaped, but his spine just falls short.
Falling short, of course, would be an inaccurate phrase to describe his back’s length. It really has been a challenge to move up the levels with him; he’s so willing and sweet, but the length from his withers to his croup isn’t doing him any favors. It’s not horrific - I certainly don’t think it causes him any pain - but it wouldn’t surprise me if he developed a little swayback later in life.
I eventually gave up on finding a good saddle for him and just bought a custom one - after all, with his continued success, he deserves it. He has a massage therapist as well (a complete money pit, might I add, but worth it since it noticeably improves his performance). I do a hefty amount of pole work in hopes of strengthening his core and, hopefully, with continued work, he’ll stay sound for several years to come. (WC: 320)
Location: St. Petersburg
Bank Account: Cavallo Stables Bank Account