Monday at Catterick

We are triple handed in the bumper today at Catterick, Episode in one division and Jessie Pinkman and Dibble Bridge on the other ( and that looks the stronger  split) Three young horses who have already had one run to date, Jessie faring the best when 3rd at Musselburgh. Episode is out of our mare, Epicurean so we would love him to improve on his first run, and Dibble Bridge will probably be going novice hurdling after this, he has come on mentally from his first start as he is very laid back at home.

We seem to be still living in the only part of the world that still has snow….as you climb out of guisbrough its all green and then get to the top of the hills and its all white…this is the view home yesterday, but surely its on its way out soon.

Luckily the main yard at Middleham has avoided it so no work has been lost with the horses.  Last week saw Ross ride Robin Ellerbeck’s Flemensfirth filly away, she is another half sister to Bedale Lane, and a very feisty one! Not the most straightforward to back but all going smoothly now, and Robin came to watch the progress on Saturday.

As we now have three Flemensfirth fillies, Sarah bought Phil this hat, ‘ i love Flemensfirth’ he was very pleased with it! We also have the 4 year old filly who was bought by the late Julie Haughton, she would have been pleased to see what a nice looking mare she had grown into, we own half of her with Keith and Debra Foster and she has been renamed ‘Arco’ by Keith as he feels its a name for a top class horse. Let’s hope she lives up  to the name then! The third Flemensfirth filly was bought by us at Tatts sales last week and we are putting her away to sell at the DBS store sales in May, we would hope she could double her purchase price, if not a fair bit more. She was one of only a handful of 2 and 3 year olds at the sale we attended, a very early lot and the ring was quiet as she went through, everybody busy looking at the yearlings….Good for us! She is well grown,  a super mover and most importantly out of a black type dam who won round Auteil and already bred 4 winners including a bumper winner. She is just the sort of filly to take to the store sale and we will have her long reining before she goes. Flemensfirth has a £10k  stud fee, he is one of the dearest NH stallions at stud. More information about her nearer the time will be posted on our Monivea Bloodstock website.

Becky Dempsey sent us this photo of Our former triple winner ‘Jawaab’  enjoying himself out hunting, acting as nanny  to her daughter. He was very well behaved and Becky said he loved his new job. We love it when our old boys get such super homes. Cool Operator has just gone to a new home with Gemma  Newcombe near Brimham Rocks, she plans to give him 10 months off before retraining him to compete next winter. Gemma runs a big livery yard with excellent facilities and is very experienced , we look forward to seeing Howards progress with her once fully recuperated.