Taproot Stud

Taproot Stud Quality Irish Hunters for Jumpers, Event and Field. TSH is a small Irish Sport Horse breeding operation standing ISH stallion Taproot Dutch Diamond.

Taproot's goal is to breed sound, sane athletes to be competitive jumpers, event and first flight field hunters suited to the ambitious amateur rider. We breed for movement, jump and stamina to be competitive in the big rings. We use a combination of Irish Draught with Thoroughbred and 'blood' warmbloods to create an elegant, noble horse with the aesthetic and performance of a classic Irish hunter

. TSH has limited youngstock for available for sale. If you are interested in one of our horses please let us know. Preference is given to show homes.

01/09/2025

Lovely 4 y/o Taproot Prime filly owned by Em Lindsay Burroughs of Maryland.

31/08/2025

New feed fence line complete!

Clooney update.
28/08/2025

Clooney update.

28/08/2025

Our little riding school committed to take students to the park yesterday before finding out the 11h pony was lame. To not disappoint the kids, we enlisted to cart around a 5 y/o. She’d never had a child on her back. This cute video of our instructor’s 2 y/o with her just before we mounted up should give good indication how we knew she would rock her new role as school pony.

Nothing is better than a mature broodmare!

Taproot Aspen just starting to jump. 4 y/o filly by Taproot Prime out of a winning Flatter dam.
26/08/2025

Taproot Aspen just starting to jump. 4 y/o filly by Taproot Prime out of a winning Flatter dam.

25/08/2025

Raven had the zoomies last night. You can see our little orphan c**t by Royal out of Lizzy joining in.

25/08/2025

I was talking with a ‘trainer’ at a hunt trailride and I told her we bred IDSH. She responded, “Irish are a good type but I’ve never had success with auto changes. They can’t do them.”

As this lady was a total stranger. I don’t know how she rides. I didn’t go down the rabbit hole with all the reasons she may find this the case. Better to express myself here.

1. Temperament- A. Irish are very kind horses. Because of this, they are often chored with carting around riders that lack strength, finesse and ample education. Of course this would handicap the animal in executing a sharp auto change. Often these ‘husband horse’ types aren’t finely tuned on the aids and/or worked to a caliber of strength and fitness for self carriage to do the change.

B. Lazy. You may have the same experience as us. Our horses make no effort in the free-jump chute until the fences are at least 3’6”. They would rather counter canter around then do a swap. We love them for their easy personality.

2. Conformation- Historically, some Irish horses have been big shouldered, short withered, long backed with light hind ends and heavy heads. Breeding has come a long way with better education, inspection process and incentives like YHS that give feedback to the breeder on their program. Modern built, well balanced animals have no problem with canter lead changes. The canter gait is much lighter now than 20 years ago. Go back and watch old Upperville videos.

3. Rider/Training - To expand on #1; how many US hunter riders can truly develop a horse to a point of self carriage? TBs are trained the change on the track by professionals, most WBs are trained by pros in Europe. These are the horses most often seen in the hunter rings. Not many American riders are developing their show horse themself.

I’m saddened that this is their reputation. I’ve heard the same stereotype before. As enthusiasts, we should work to change this perception.

Please share video on this post of your horse doing a lead change.

Cheers ❤️

Just enough light to appreciate
23/08/2025

Just enough light to appreciate

Clooney in his first micro jumper class.
20/08/2025

Clooney in his first micro jumper class.

Clooney is getting this jumping thing down 😍
19/08/2025

Clooney is getting this jumping thing down 😍

Our good friend Spencer earning Pre-Short Stirrup division on .
17/08/2025

Our good friend Spencer earning Pre-Short Stirrup division on .

It’s fantastic we’ve had a flush of interest in our horses! Buyers often come through an ad and make it onto our website...
12/08/2025

It’s fantastic we’ve had a flush of interest in our horses! Buyers often come through an ad and make it onto our website, inquiring about a retained stock individual.

We love that you really like our breeding stock. “No, they are not available at this time.”

It takes decades to develop bloodlines. And by ‘develop’ I don’t mean casually breeding forward the next generation. Our damlines are meticulously chosen. I’ve been using one line since 2004; now growing out our 4th generation.

I’ve noticed certain traits group together attached to certain chromosomes. Some skip a generation, others breed true every time. I’m building a genetic powerhouse that will pass consistently for decades. It’s a high cull project.

We are moving into a new phase in the non-traditional program; breeding back to our foundation mare lines looking for foals similar to those that have come through before.
We have a Pere/TB filly, Rua’s Prime c**t and filly, and both Hottie’s latest c**ts retained.

I’m excited about our fledgling traditional program. Royal is proving incredibly consistent. We have 2 TBx fillies, a TBx c**t and a wonder of a c**t out of Janie (Mystic Replica/ConnieX) all are absolutely lovely.
We won’t be keeping all of these long term, but will be running some test breedings this coming season.

Sale stock foals are still fabulous! ‘Sale’ is not an indicative determination of future performance, athleticism, attitude, trainability, etc. These are still very nice horses, but not the capsules of DNA we were hoping for.

I think breeders fall into a few categories; breeding for themselves, breeding to win and breeding for the betterment of the breed. We fall in the 3rd distinction. In order for us to continue our mission of correct, dominant traits we need the market to support us. If we sell a yearling filly that is 6 years of work built in, we can never get that time back. We won’t be able to build on our effort.

To bring consistent product, we need to study and test our lines.

We know riders are here for a good time, but we’re here for a long time. Please don’t give us flack for not selling you a horse. Keep following us, they may be available in the future. Also, we won’t be selling intact c**ts unless from an outside stallion. We are protective of our Y DNA.

Photo of ‘09 and ‘10 IDHSNA Partbred Performance Champion Taproot Coppanaugh by It’s the Luck of the Irish o/o Jezebel (Voltaire). Also, Taproot Dutch Diamond winner of a very competitive 3 y/o YHS Jump Chute Class and approved IDSH stallion. Taproot Rua Diamond, 2019 IDHSNA Youngstock Champion and Bronze Merit IDSH. All bred from It’s the Luck of the Irish line. Susan Yates

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VA

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+14343638513

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