Strong dam lines are the foundation of the breeding herd.
Our Irish Draught broodmares are from old, traditional West of Ireland mare families which have consistently produced top class progeny of exceptional breed type.
As a dear friend of ours describes her, "Hermione is perfection itself". This mare is the genuine article...a true-to-type Irish Draught mare with fantastic bone, flawless limbs, athletic movement and that amazing Irish temperament.
Hermione's pedigree is stacked with show jumping blood with a cross to Laughton through Ginger Dick, and two crosses to King of Diamonds, one through her grandsire Glidawn Diamond and another through her great great grandsire Flagmount Boy. Her pedigree also includes a cross to Ben Purple, grandsire of Olympic gold medal eventer Custom Made.
Hermione is a full sister to the R.I.D. stallion Lionwood Kinsale's Lad, and one of only 2 fully approved R.I.D. mares by their talented sire *O'Leary's Irish Diamond R.I.D.. *O'Leary's Irish Diamond is the product of a very successful mare family descending from the Gortlee (426) daughter Black Beauty. This family has produced numerous superb broodmares and 9 RID stallions. *O'Leary's Irish Diamond has competed successfully at the Prix St. George level on the tough Florida dressage circuit and he is a winner in the open jumpers...talk about versatility! 
Hermione's sibling out of a Thoroughbred mare, Diamond Elle, is one of several successful young jumpers by *O'Leary's Irish Diamond. She placed 12th overall in the 5 year-old division of the 2004 International Jumper Futurity's East Coast Finals, and she won two of the 6 year-old qualifiers in 2005 and a 7 year-old qualifier in 2006. Diamond Elle is currently competing and placing in national level grands prix.
Finally, Hermione's uncle, Coolcorron Cool Diamond, is a champion international showjumper, representing Ireland in World Cup competitions, in addition to being named to the Irish team short-list for the 2004 Olympics!
Like her dam Bonnie, Hermione is 15.3 hands with 9 1/2 inches of bone. She is maturing into a lovely traditional mare, demonstrating the heritage and strength of her family with the foals she has produced to date. In March 2004 she presented us with a stunning purebred filly with the most extravagant movement, Rowan (right). By our former R.I.D. stallion Harkaway Lionhawk, Rowan was purchased as a dressage prospect when she was only 4 months of age and is the soulmate of her young owner Keegan Cairns who has big plans for her! Hermione followed up in May 2005 with another lovely filly, Glimmer, by *Huntingfield Proud Tim. Glimmer passed her R.I.D. approval this autumn and has been sold to our friends at Ballymore Stud in Michigan, where she will have a performance career before having foals of her own. Hermione's most recent foal is Grania, a daughter of the lovely old R.I.D. stallion *Grange Augustus. Sadly, Grania is *Grange Augustus' only contribution to the purebred gene pool as "Gus" is now retired from breeding and his only other purebred offspring was gelded. Gus is a stallion of wonderful temperament, type, and movement and we feel very fortunate to be able to carry on his line through Grania.
So far all of Hermione's foals have been natural jumpers - to the extent that it can be a challenge keeping them confined. More importantly they have the superb temperament of their dam and granddam, which makes them a joy to work with.
Hermione is currently taking a "riding hiatus" and will be bred back to Harkaway Lionhawk in the Spring of '08.
Bred by our dear friend Rachael Cox, we purchased Brodie last summer, just after she turned 2 years old. Brodie's sire *Snowford Bellman RID needs no introduction in Irish Draught circles. Bellman is a well known sire (and damsire) of approved breeding stallions and show ring champions and he is revered as one of the best movers in the breed. Brodie's dam *Ginger's Beauty comes from a prolific West of Ireland mare family descending from the Barna (442) mare Mullagh Pride. This family has produced a number of successful performance horses, including Pippa Funnell's young homebred eventers Billy Black Jack and Billy Landretti (winner of the PAVO 4 yo finals), and show jumpers Miss Baloubet (2nd place out of 23 - 3 yo Loose Jumping Championships and 4th place 6/7 yo Show Jumping Championships in Ireland), C and G Aldo, Andretti Diamond, and many others. The approved RID stallion Castana, who currently stands in Ireland, is also a product of this exceptional mare family.
Brodie is the perfect combination of her parents, with her sire's outstanding elevated movement and both parent's substance and elegance. Brodie's pedigree displays an interesting assortment of older Irish Draught bloodlines and more modern performance lines. Notably, her pedigree features the prominent influence of Irish Draught foundation sire Comet (1), with four lines to Glengarrif (223), two to Glen Lad (458), and crosses to Gortlee (426), Clareman (429), and Clonfert (219). Her pedigree also contains five crosses to the rare Woodranger (24) sire line and two to the equally rare Young Arthur (9) sire line. In contrast to our other Draughts, Brodie has significant Thoroughbred blood in her background through the combined influence of Irish Draught sires Ginger Dick, Ballynoe Boy, and Skippy (sire of Jumbo, who sired '07 Badminton and '06 Burghley winner Headley Britannia, among many others). Brodie is in fact linebred (though distantly so) to influential Thoroughbred sires Son-in-Law, Marco, and Marco's sire Hurry On. She is also linebred to Double Life, dam of Precipitation. All of these horses feature prominently in the pedigrees of Holsteiner and Selle Francais foundation sires Cottage Son, Furioso, Rantzau, and Cor de la Bryere. Although Brodie has the typical generous ID character, you can see the TB influence in her quality and quickness off the ground. She has scope to spare over poles and we think she would make an exceptional performance horse.
We plan to present Brodie for RID approval next year. We will add photos to her profile soon, stay tuned.
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