Happy New Year everyone, and welcome to part 4 of our blog!
2022 will be our 4th year of “Linsop” Riding Pony foals, and it really has flown by! Our first ever foal Linsop Set the Scene (Anton Prince Charming X Brookhall Miss Milly) is now 3 and we are really excited to start his groundwork later in the year ready for lightly backing over the winter. Malcolm also carries PBA/PBW blood with the loveliest trainable temperament, and is very good with kids, we have high hopes for him as a 128cm Children’s Riding Pony.
From a showing point of view we don’t do very much over winter. Our two ridden hacks enjoyed a couple of months off work to be horses and get hairy and muddy which they have thoroughly enjoyed! However they are now back in work long reining and lungeing preparing for the 2022 season.
Since our last blog was published we attended “STARS Champion of Champions” at Aintree back in November. We represented our local riding club Equi-Stars, which we love being a part of and supporting, there’s no better starting place for Novice ponies! We took along Milltimber Little Scoundrel (Harvie) our 6yo Novice PBA/Hack who had qualified for the Open Plaited over 148cm Championship, and Linsop Count On Me (Percy), our (then) yearling colt who had qualified for the equivalent under 148cm Championship. To our shock, Harvie won his final out of a huge class of quality animals, and our little homebred was 8th, the youngest to be placed by far! This was extra special as he was competing against open ponies, and gained one of the top few conformation marks. STARS is a fantastic show designed to give home-produced competitors a HOYS experience, and the standard is incredible. Well worth joining your local riding club to try and qualify as it was a magical evening, many glasses of fizz were consumed!!
Turning to our breeding we have 3 foals due this year, so will be very busy from April onwards, it is a challenge fitting our ponies and breeding plans around 2 full time jobs, but we are very lucky that Linds works from home, meaning someone is on site with them 24/7. Let the sleepless nights begin..! We have Rhos Extravagance in foal to the Cochran family’s stunning boy Jackets Shades of Blue, and Ellenbrook Ladies Day and Laybalands Birthday Girl in foal to our own Royalview Splendour. We have been carefully looking for a bigger mare to add to our breeding program for some time, waiting for the right one, we saw an advert for the beautiful hack mare Dallamires White Lilly and knew she was the one! “Lily” came to join us at the Linsop Stud at the weekend, bringing some lovely bloodlines to our breeding program. She is by Up with the Lark and out of Bankswood Sophistication (SOD Comberton Cadet). We now get to start the exciting process of finding the right stallion for her!
Thank you for reading, and the very best of luck for the 2022 show season! We are always looking to meet and connect with other breeders as we progress with our journey, so feel free to add us as friends or follow our page on Facebook:
Linsop Stud & Show Team
Lindsey Hewitt
Sophie Clohessy