and Jane began a conversation about breeding and riding. Jane continued it from the side of the arena once Michaela was on the mare, and, now that I was less focused on my equine fantasy’s latest lateral evasion and more focused on getting my nasty, sweaty helmet off my head, I could pay attention to the conversation. Michaela is using one of our mares to produce a horse specifically for her, so she’s weighing her stallion options. I came into the conversation just as Jane was saying, “Breeders and riders look for different things. If riders were doing the breeding, we’d be breeding for what’s between the ears, first and foremost.” I can’t say that this was an “Oh, my god, of course!”
moment for me. It was more of a “tightening of the girth” on a philosophy toward which I’ve been leaning. It’s also not something I’ve ignored in our breeding program, but it certainly hasn’t been the priority—movement and type have. Well, I’m too big to look good on many of the horses I’ve bred, too much of an amateur to handle the movement of more of them, and admittedly too afraid of making an abrupt and unexpected landing in the expensive footing of Larkspur Farm (footing which I’m sure isn’t as cushy as it looks) to handle the athleticism of our very best ones. As it happens, we did, in fact, breed Princess specifically for me. My wife, Carol, gave me a breeding to Contango
for Father’s Day in 2003, with the understanding that I keep the resulting foal for me to ride. Just over 11 months later, Princess was literally born on my feet when I ran home between classes to check on her dam. She’s grown into a 17-hand, close to 1400-pound mare. She’s more talented than my riding abilities deserve; however, other than an occasional moody and over-sensitive, “I understood the half-halt the first time…I just chose to ignore it” buck and a propensity for (and creative initiator of) lateral evasions, she puts up with me. I can’t chalk this up to my breeding prowess, however. I just got really lucky: I picked the right wife. By the time Michaela eventually gives one of my yet-
to-be-born grandchildren the opportunity to breed a horse for him or herself, hopefully, the future Tolman horse fanatic will be as lucky as I to make a good spousal decision—and luckier still to have a more rider-friendly breeding base from which to work.
WT Scot Tolman has been breeding
Dutch Warmbloods for over 20 years at Shooting Star Farm in Southwestern New Hampshire. Read more of Scot’s writing at
shootingstarfarm.com.
114 January/February 2012
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