11/23/2023
On this day of Thanksgiving, I give heartfelt thanks that I can be a small part of making lives better for the horses that I love and their families. It is always a gamble breeding and purchasing horses to sell, but I have been luckier than many in finding them exceptional lifelong homes and for that I thank you all for sharing your stories.
Our Cedar Lane Farm horse of the week is Axel Foley KCH, by Ambassadeur of Canada GF and out of Lotta Gold MMH by none other than founding sire Alpen Konig. Lotta Gold was out of the incredible mare La Gold, who I had the privilege of seeing years ago. Some of them just make an impression that last forever. I have purchased everything I could related to that mare line. Axel was born at an Amish farm in Ohio, which I find amusing since he is named after the character in Beverly Hills Cop played by Eddie Murphy. I purchased him to train and sell, he wasn’t on our farm long before he started getting attention due to his cute face. Sidney Kerr and her mom came out to look at him and chose him for their family and renamed him Edelweiss, shortened to Edel. He is now 20 years old and here is his story sent in by his person, Sidney:
I feel like a lot of these write ups that I read are about how the rider knew at the first meeting of the horse that they were special. Maybe for some people that’s the case, but it definitely wasn’t that kind of start for us. The start for us was in 2006, when he was a very green baby, and I was a very dumb, young teenager who didn’t want to ride a green baby. He wasn’t originally even for me, he was for my mom. She rode him until she fell off the first time, and then she was done riding.
I think Edel spent the first 3 years that we had him on trail, out in a group or by himself, and didn’t see the inside of a ring until he was maybe 7. My horse Joe at the time was unfortunately a very unsound fellow. Before Joe was completely retired, I would ride Edel when he wasn’t sound. I had some horse friends who were on a western drill team when I was a senior in high school, so I joined them. Parades, performances at the Kentucky Horse Park, and more, we did it and had a blast. The reason I left drill was being told that Edel was “too flashy, too small, and the wrong breed.” (Don’t worry, the lady who told me that, we kicked her butt a few years later in the open pen in every single class she entered.)
So we did other things. From April to November I was at Faustman Ranch in Dayton two or three weekends a month horse showing for years. We did gymkhana, the open shows, and every clinic I could sign us up for. We learned how to ranch rope and went and roped cows that were as big as he is. By the time I moved away, I had a mountain of ribbons, medals, 8 belt buckles, and two jackets.
We spent a season on the Dayton Local Show Circuit having a great time in the baby greens. We spent a year doing mounted games, competing playing mug shuffle, sword rings, and more, ending in reserve for our division. I borrowed a cart one summer, hooked him up, and drove him around. Prior to that, he would have only been driven before my family bought him. We went on hunter paces galloping first flight through the woods and over massive trees.
I went to the University of Findlay where I used him on the Ranch Horse team at the shows. He easily kept up with the quarter horses, and even beat them in ranch trail and boxing. My senior year, I tried out for the eventing team with him and evented at several USEA shows. I graduated and we were set to compete at Chattahoochee Hills, for Intercollegiate Eventing Championships. A week before we would leave, he got injured in the field, right in front of me. He had shredded his superficial digital flexor tendon. Prognosis was “maybe trail sound, if we’re lucky.” It took 2 years, hundreds of hours on my part, more dollars than I want to think about, and a darn good vet, farrier, and trainer who worked as a team to get him sound.
We have been riding with USDF silver medalist Katherine Byrd since 2020 who is out-of-this-world knowledgeable. She helped me get him from just trot work to real work in rehab. In 2021, we started horse showing again. We didn’t just horse show though, we cleaned house.
He now gets used a few times a week as a lesson pony for the walk trot kids. He is good 90% of the time for the littles. Normally someone has to motivate him from the ground to trot for the kids whose legs don’t even go past the saddle pad. Occasionally though, he decides it’s a great day to go, and instead of cantering the long side and then trotting the short, it’s all canter. However, the kids all still keep picking him to ride when given the choice. Clearly, they have good taste.
At the time of writing this, November 2023, we have 307 ribbons. 107 of them are first places. 206 are top 3. He received the “Lifetime Achievement Award” from American Haflinger Registry in 2019 for our show career. We have thousands of hours in the show pen, and at this point probably close to ten thousand hours of ride time together. He is a testament to his breeding, and absolutely made me a Haflinger owner for the rest of my life. As much as people think about the conformation and size of the horse being what will allow them to achieve their dreams, I think it’s more about what’s between those two little golden ears, and what’s sitting in that barrel of a chest.