Blacklist - Con Amore!

Between the M62 and the Humber Estuary, across the river from Goole in the East Riding of Yorkshire, is the farm where the Goulden family run their arable and mixed farm and follow their love of horses by managing a small breeding operation, Skelton Horses, based upon their own broodmare herd and their two current TB stallions – Bollin Archie and Blacklist.

Skelton Horses is truly a family operation – David’s eldest son Tim helps with the stud and the farm; his youngest son, Steven, combines managing the administrative side of the business with following a career as a classical singer! He trained at the Royal Welsh College of Music, gaining a number of awards, and now, as well as performing as a soloist, provides the tenor voice in the classical vocal duo “Amore!”, partnered by Soprano Emma Dennis (who is also his partner in real life).

David Goulden has worked with horses since his childhood on the farm, when heavy horses were used to work the land; he bought his first Shire mare in the early 1960s, and started breeding Shires when they were still listed as an endangered species. He has been a member of the Shire Horse Society for 50 years, has bred many stars of the show ring, and was also a highly respected judge on the show circuit. His successes have not been limited to the one breed – he has also bred Welsh cobs and later Hackneys, (through the influence the late Arthur Grant of the famous 'Grants' Hackney Stud), standing the very successful Hackney stallion Hurstwood Romeo until his retirement.

Above: Bollin Archie

The first TBs arrived at the farm as a result of an enquiry from Buskhill Stud in the late 1960s. The stud was short of keep, and they were looking for a local farm where they could send a number of their mares. The contact led to the Gouldens standing a number of TB stallions over the years – 6 over the last 40 years, all, as Steven Goulden, says, “staying with us for life”. One of the best known was Towern, whose damsire Nimbus was the 1949 Derby winner, and who came to the Gouldens as a result of an injury early in his racing career. He went on to be a successful sire of show hunters, showjumpers and hunters. A daughter, West End Evita, competed in the 1990 Stockholm World Equestrian Games, the Seoul Olympics and the World Championships with George Sanna and the Australian team.

Both the stallions currently standing at Skelton Horses have extremely interesting pedigrees for the sport horse breeder, and the family have high hopes for the 4 year old Blacklist, who in spite of only being available to a small number of outside mares last year has already started to attract wider interest. The owner of Lowmoor Fallon (by the ID stallion Snowford Benson), the Yorkshire Broodmare of the Year at the 2009 Yorkshire Show, brought her to be covered by Blacklist this year, and is looking forward to a fine 2011 foal. He has covered a variety of mares last year and this, from the Shire X TBs in the Skelton broodmare herd, to a polo pony and an ID mare.

Blacklist was sold to Germany as a foal, and then brought back to the UK as a 2 year old and put into training with Jedd O’Keeffe in North Yorkshire. David Goulden was contacted by friends who were members of a racing syndicate, asking if he would be interested in a 3 year old colt who was not proving fast enough to be successful on the track – and this was Blacklist! “Nero”, as he is called at home, has an impressive pedigree, with his sire being the American stallion Dr Fong, winner of the St James Palace Stakes, whose progeny include Shamdinan (winner of the Group One Secretariat Stakes), Ask for the Moon, and Purple Orchid. His popularity as a sire was reflected in the average sale price achieved by his yearlings of £40,050 in 2007.

Dr Fong’s sire Kris S was himself a highly successful sire, and is much prized in the US in sport horse pedigrees. He was a son of the 1972 Derby winner Roberto who was highly influential in international breeding, and descended from the Hail to Reason branch of the Nearco sire line. Kris S's dam was Sharp Queen, a daughter of the North American Champion Sire and seven-time Champion Broodmare Sire Princequillo.

Dr Fong’s damsire, Miswaki, traces back to Raise a Native through Mr Prospector (who seems to provoke a lot of arguments about the value that he adds in a sport horse pedigree: there are persistent rumbles about soundness/propensity to lameness in his progeny, though he was a prolific sire of winners, and when he died was buried at Claiborne Farm, Paris, Kentucky, between the two greats - Nijinsky and Secretariat, in acknowledgement of his achievements).

Miswaki’s damsire was another great name in TB breeding – Buckpasser, renowned for breeding great jumpers with outstandingly good temperaments, with powerful uphill going. Buckpasser’s “large heart” was inherited by a number of his progeny, giving them outstanding stamina and staying power.

On his dam side, Blacklist traces back to the influential Grey Sovereign, a winner on the track, and a significant influence on European sport horse breeding, appearing in the pedigrees of Corrado, Clinton, and Sir Shostakovitch xx amongst others. Raise a Native appears again in the damsire line, linking back to the great Teddy, who was considered to have transformed American breeding.

With this pedigree, Blacklist would certainly be a stallion to consider for the sport horse breeder – he doesn’t yet have enough foals on the ground to be certain of the type of mare that he is likely to go best with, though I think that an ID x TB mare might provide the ideal if one was looking to breed an eventer.

His stablemate Bollin Archie has Mr Prospector, Northern Dancer and Pocahontas (the Broodmare of the Year in 1965) in his bottom line, with Pocahontas taking us back once more to Princequillo and Teddy.

Through his sire First Trump, Bollin Archie has a line of consistent progenitors of showjumpers and eventers. First Trump himself was a Group One winner, and sired runners on the flat and over hurdles, as well as showjumpers and eventers. On the topline of his pedigree, Bollin Archie traces back to some of the most influential names in TB breeding – Nasrullah, Grey Sovereign (again!), Abernant, (one of the key TB foundation stallions in the KWPN studbook), and Fair Trial (a prolific stakes winner).

The Gouldens are happy to be running a small stud that largely relies on word of mouth to attract the numbers of mares that they are comfortable accommodating. Steven describes his father David as a very modest man, and there is a real sense of tradition and the many years of experience and horsemanship that have gone into a consistently successful stud as he talks about the horses and their achievements. You sense that blowing their own trumpet, or noisily promoting their stallions, would be a completely alien approach for the Gouldens .... but as mare owners are constantly on the lookout for that most desirable and most elusive of beasts – the next great TB sport horse sire – I would predict that Skelton Horses, Bollin Archie and Blacklist are likely to be receiving many more visitors in the future .... con amore!

Links: Skelton Horses:www.skeltonhorses.co.uk Amore Duo www.amoreduo.co.uk

Below: images of Blacklist, Bollin Archie and offspring