Grafennacht – the journey of William Fox-Pitt on the Mars Badminton Horse Trials – might these days be the debate of the city, however her breeder believes her dam may have been much more sensible. The breeding of Grafennacht is an odd tale.
Suzie Banyard was once given Grafennacht’s mum Nachtigall when the mare was once 18, and began eventing her at 19. They received the BE100 most sensible horse and rider award that yr, and went directly to compete at complicated, regardless of Suzie by no means having evented earlier than.
“Nachtigall was once given to me by way of my pal Nicky Killon to seem after and possibly hack round,” says Suzie, who has additionally showjumped to Grade A. “I began enjoying together with her and taking her to do a little native issues, then realised she was once too just right to simply do dressage and showjumping, so I made up our minds to have a cross at eventing. I used to be turning 40 and he or she was once 19 – neither folks knew what we have been doing, no clue! She had no festival document in any respect.”
An editorial from Horse & Hound when Nachtigall retired from eventing.
Suzie continues: “She was once an excessively gorgeous horse and an unbelievable, unbelievable jumper. Went complicated in 3 or 4 seasons, and not had a prevent cross-country. I’d by no means even sat in a dressage saddle earlier than, and the one cross-country fences I’d jumped have been as a child. She was once unbelievable. I’d say if she’d began on the proper time, she would had been no less than as just right, if now not higher, than Grafennacht – a lovely mare.”
Nicky had at the start meant to make use of Nachtigall as a broodmare – she’s by way of the German thoroughbred sire Narew, who was once used so much to lighten German warmblood strains. On the other hand, Nicky by no means controlled to get her in foal.
Suzie temporarily made up our minds to have a cross at an embryo switch because it was once “too overdue” for a 19-year-old mare to hold a foal, particularly along her new burgeoning festival profession.
“It took a couple of tries and by chance we have been fortunate sufficient to have Lillie [Grafennacht],” Suzie says. “However I attempted once more for some other 3 or 4 season afterwards and not controlled to get the mare to conceive once more. So Lillie is a whole one-off.”
Grafennacht breeding: may the road proceed?
On the other hand, Suzie was once so eager to “lengthen Nachtigall” that once the good mare’s lifestyles ended on the age of 30, a few years in the past, she’d had the foresight to stay her choices open.
“I’ve Nachtigall’s frozen DNA in a lab in France,” Suzie says. “I truly wish to to find anyone who needs to take that on and probably create a clone.”
When Lillie was once born, she spent the primary 4 years of her lifestyles with Suzie, who recalls her as “very precocious”.
“She was once pretentious, she knew who she was once proper from the start,” Suzie says. “She was once very single-minded and I will be able to’t rely how repeatedly she had us at the flooring as a foal. If she was once going someplace, she was once going.
“Being an embryo switch foal, she had a surrogate mom, and so they may now not had been extra other. The mare was once an actual undeniable Jane, and Lillie was once gorgeous. And he or she was once so athletic as a toddler doing those loopy gymnastics within the box, and this deficient outdated mare gave the look of she was once announcing, ‘that’s now not my kid’ – in fact it wasn’t. Nachtigall in the meantime was once within the subsequent door box, and had no concept who the foal was once.
“Lillie appears to be like very similar to Nachtigall, even supposing Nachtigall had extra white on her. She was once completely surprising. I selected Grafenstolz as a result of I sought after to stay Nachtigall’s dressage talent in addition to the eventing. He has a tendency to stamp all his inventory along with his appears to be like. Fortuitously numerous the prettiness of her mom got here thru to Lillie.”
As though the Grafennacht tale isn’t outstanding sufficient, she is the only and most effective foal Suzie has bred.
“I used to be simply looking to breed an excellent horse, as a result of I may by no means have a complete profession together with her mom on account of her age,” Suzie says. “So Lillie was once some way of extending Nachtigall.”
We’d say it’s labored out beautiful neatly certainly.
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