Horse & Hound
Brazos Valley Mystic: LIke Father, Like Son
Brazos Valley Mystic 2010 / Liz Callar photoBrazos Valley Mystic 2010 was judged Grand Champion of the Southwest Hound Show for the third consecutive year, matching his sire’s outstanding performance there. The show was held on April 20, 2013 at Greenwood Farms in Weatherford, Texas.
Mystic’s success is no stroke of luck; he’s the product of a royal breeding engineered by Brazos Valley MFH Sandy Dixon. She put her own sire—Brazos Valley Catfish 2006—to a Potomac-bred bitch that she entered in 2006—Brazos Valley Meadow.
Catfish won three consecutive Grand Championships at the Southwest Hound Show in 2007, 2008, and 2009, and Meadow brought her own credentials from Maryland. She was bred by Potomac huntsman Larry Pitts and is by Potomac Jefferson, Grand Champion of both the Virginia Foxhound Show and the Bryn Mawr Hound Show in 2007. Jefferson was knockout handsome.
Professor Maxwell Wins Maryland Hunt Cup
Look, Ma, no stirrups! Mark Beecher flies four timber fences without stirrups on his way to victory aboard Professor Maxwell in the 117th running of the Maryland Hunt Cup.
In a gutsy performance, Mark Beecher rode Mrs. George Ohrstrom’s Professor Maxwell to victory in the Maryland Hunt Cup despite a recently broken collarbone and a lost stirrup.
The collarbone was broken only two weeks earlier at the My Lady’s Manor races. Fortunately, the horse is a careful jumper and, according to Beecher, requires only that the rider sit quietly and do nothing. Beecher did just that without stirrups over four of the imposing solid timber fences.
Trainer Richard Valentine called Beecher’s ride “remarkable.”
Blue Ridge Runs Postponed Point-to-Point
Whodoyoucallit (Woods Winants) wins Novice Timber. / Liz Callar photoThe Blue Ridge Hunt Point-to-Point Races, originally scheduled for Saturday, March 9 but postponed due to a snowstorm, were finally held on a sunny but cool Sunday, April 21, 2013—six weeks later. A good crowd of spectators enjoyed a brilliant day out-of-doors, but entries were down with the sanctioned Middleburg Spring Races having been run the day before.
Eva Smithwick—2012 leading trainer in Virginia—saddled two winners for Indian Run Farm, both ridden by Woods Winants. Fogcutter, with two previous hurdle wins at Thornton Hill and Old Dominion, won the Amateur/Novice Rider Hurdle, and Whodoyoucallit, with a win earlier in the season at Thornton Hill, won the Novice Timber. Neither horse was seriously challenged.
Radnor Hunts the Big Bend
Radnor huntsman Joe Cassidy and hounds at Big Bend / Diana Rowland photoThe gray uncertain sky and falling barometer suggested that winter was not yet finished with us. Nevertheless, I had rearranged my previously planned trip to Aiken after Joe Cassidy called. Joe hunted Mr. Stewart’s Cheshire Foxhounds (PA) for eighteen years and is currently huntsman for the Radnor Hunt (PA). This was an opportunity for me to hunt in his back pocket.
Joe had taught me to hunt hounds while I was MFH at Loudoun Hunt (VA), and he hunted with me when I carried the horn for a couple of years, making the drive with his wife Leslie and their very large dog Luca each weekend.
The meet was at Big Bend, the long-time residence of Frolic Weymouth, well-known for his immense contributions to open space conservancy. It was a Saturday meet, March 16, 2013, and as we sat waiting for the last of the field to mount and the clock to strike 11:00, Joe turned in his saddle, handed me his horn, and quietly told me that I was hunting the pack that day. I confess to a moment of stage fright, made some knuckle-head comment about strike hounds to which he replied, “Really,” and then we headed off to the first covert—a thick patch of brambles, ground cover, and trees about the size of a football field.
Morris/Roberts Team Dominates Loudoun Races
Magalen Bryant's Triplekin (Jacob Roberts up) wins the second division of the Novice Timber for trainer Neil Morris. The Bryant/Roberts/Morris team won the first division Novice Timber as well with Classic Bridges ./ Liz Callar photo
Trainer Neil Morris and jockey Jacob Roberts teamed up at the Loudoun Hunt Point-to-Point to win four of their five races over fences at Oatlands in Leesburg, Virginia, Sunday, April 14, 2013.
After a fifth place showing in the first division of the first race (Maiden Hurdle)—won by Silverado Beach, rider Jeff Murphy, trainer Doug Fout—Morris-trained horses with Roberts in the irons swept the four remaining brush and timber races on the card.
Big Crossbred Turnout at Southern Hound Show
Mooreland Wary '12, Grand Champion, Southern Hound Show / Wendy Butler photoThe seventh annual Southern Hound Show, held on April 6, 2013 at Live Oak Plantation Monticello, Florida, produced a perfect day for showing hounds—chilly in the morning and low seventies in the afternoon.
This year’s judges were Mr. Richard Tyacke, MFH and huntsman of Sir Watkin Williams-Wynn’s Wynnstay Hounds (UK), and Mrs. Tyacke who substituted for Dr. John W. D. McDonald, MFH, London Hunt (ON), who took ill the night before the show. Dr. Charlotte McDonald, MFH, London Hunt, was the apprentice judge.
Mr. Tyacke said that he was thrilled by the amount of quality he saw in every class. He was very impressed with the levelness shown, particularly in the Two Couple Classes where some hunts produced more than one entry.
As is the custom at the show, all hound types are judged together in one ring, as also happens at the Canadian Hound Show. Eight packs showed, which is one more than showed in the 35-couple-or-more in the Crossbred ring at Virginia in 2012.
The Cheshire Crossbred: A Bold Gamble
The new Cheshire Crossbreds combine the best traits of two disparate foxhound types / Jim Graham photo
When an established hunt with a reputation for showing the best of sport to the best of horsemen in the best of countries comes up with a novel idea for breeding a better foxhound, and sees it through to fruition and success, one has to pay attention.
The venerable—one hundred years this season—Mr. Stewart’s Cheshire Foxhounds in Unionville, Pennsylvania traditionally hunted the Old English foxhound under the hunt’s founder W. Plunket Stewart and the active Mastership of his step-daughter, the late Mrs. John (Nancy Penn Smith) Hannum. Masters and members know the breed very well.
Ireland’s County Galway Foxhounds (The Blazers), another venerable hunt renowned for showing world-class sport, also hunts the Old English foxhound. Cheshire huntsman Ivan Dowling grew up following the Blazers, and he too knows the Old English foxhound very well.
History and familiarity notwithstanding, seven years ago the Cheshire Masters and their Galway-born huntsman Dowling decided to continue a breeding experiment begun two years earlier by former huntsman John Tullock. They committed to the notion of crossing the English foxhound with the Penn-Marydel foxhound—two disparate types—in the hope of making a better foxhound for their country. This was a chancy endeavor, understandably fraught with controversy within the hunt.
Peer Pressure
Emmy LouHounds are fascinating to watch, even after so many years at this game. Consider a recent Carrollton (MD) hound exercise, for example.
We were exercising the pack around the kennels and introduced our new entry, Emmy Lou, a blue tick Penn-Marydel that was recently drafted from a hunt in the Carolinas. I picked her up last week from Doc Addis who transported her for us from the Huntsman's Weekend down in Emporia, Virginia. She is a pretty, petite thing—timid—but seems to have loads of personality. We have all fallen in love with her, and she is getting used to her new home.
As we walked out, she ran about sniffing and exploring with the pack. Occasionally we had to tell her to "pack in," which she readily responded to. At one point as we were going up a rise, deer bounded out of the woods to our right. I turned to face our pack, and huntsman Dulany Noble told them to "steady up." She counted the deer: one, two, three, and up to eight, not more than fifty yards or less above us. Our pack watched intently but did not break. Suddenly Emmy Lou broke and went after them. My heart sank. Huntsman Dulany told everyone—canine and human alike—to steady up and she raised her new horn to her lips and blew a lovely melodic note. Emmy Lou stopped, turned, and came running back. We were so pleased, but here's the cool thing.
Smithwick Saddles Four Winners at Old Dominion
Fogcutter gives Woods Winants his first of three winning rides and trainer Eva Smithwick her first of four wins on the card in the Amateur/Novice Rider Hurdle Race. / Douglas Lees photoEva Smithwick-trained horses won four of the eight races on the card at the Old Dominion Hunt Point-to-Point held on Saturday, April 6, 2013 at Ben Venue Farm. Woods Winants drove home three of her winners: Fogcutter in the Amateur/Novice Rider Hurdle, Coturnix in the Maiden Hurdle, and Rutledge Classic in the Foxhunter Timber Race.
Smithwick’s other win came with Dr. Alex, owned and ridden by Teddy Zimmerman, in the Amateur Highweight Timber Race. This was the second win for Zimmerman and Dr. Alex in this year’s series, their previous victory coming at the Piedmont Point-to-Point.
When Photographer, Horse, and Camera Go Head Over Tail
Foxhunting photographer Gretchen Pelham / Jennnifer Calderwood photo
Gretchen Pelham’s photos have been published in numerous magazines, in Foxhunting Life, and in our annual Foxhunting Life Calendar. After telling her I was impressed that she could juggle reins, hunt whip, and camera, she said that when she rides her own horse, she uses double reins! But, she said, the whip is useful. When taking pictures, she puts it under her leg, horn up, and hooks the reins over it. That way, she can use both hands on the camera! [Ed.]
I don’t have a picture of my whopper of a cropper in the hunt field, mainly because I was the one taking the pictures. I always hunt with my Canon 20D equipped with a 300mm zoom lens shoved down the front of my hunt coat. When I see a moment worthy of a shot I put the reins in one hand, drag the camera out, and start shooting.
Sometimes I have plenty of time to shove the camera back down my coat before my Field Master takes off, but mostly I’ve learned to shove it down with one hand while breaking into a gallop. The coat really holds the big camera steady, and I can jump anything without fear of the camera coming out and clocking me on the chin.
