Cherry Creek Canadians - History
Prior to our getting our Canadian Horses, we both
had Thoroughbreds before. Jim had race horses, and Yvonne had hunter/jumper/eventers.
After having had our Thoroughbreds for a number of years, we
were beginning to get a bit disenchanted with their injury prone natures, high maintenance/feed needs, and even higher energy levels. By 1994, it became
evident that we were ready for a change.
That year we headed off for an equine vacation to the Spruce Meadows "Masters".
Until that time, we had never heard of a Canadian Horse before. It just so
happened that they were the feature breed at that year's "Masters". There
they were, front and center in the International Show Jumping ring, amidst all
the chaos of the "parade of horses".
One couldn't help but notice the small black horses calmly parading about,
totally unconcerned by the brass bands, zooming golf carts, umbrellas, balloons,
fireworks, and other total chaos surrounding them.
As soon as we saw them, we
simultaneously said to each other "that's
the horse for us!". We immediately scrambled down out of the
bleachers in search of more information about the breed. After
inquiring about them, we found to our amazement that the calm horses we
had just seen in the International ring, were not mature seasoned horses as we
surmised, but in fact were just youngsters. We couldn't believe that they had taken the whole Spruce
Meadows experience so calmly!
We proceeded to find out as much as we could about the
breed, and the more we learned, the more of an impression they made on us.
This made us all the more determined to have one - as quickly as possible!
The next thing we knew, our first Canadian
Horse - a yearling filly, was on her way out from Quebec. After she
arrived, our filly confirmed for us that indeed, this was definitely to be the breed
for us.
This was how Cherry Creek Canadians began...
And just as other have, we soon
found out that having Canadian Horses are just like eating potato chips - you can't
have just one!".
From 1994 on, we continued to carefully assemble our herd and
breeding stock by acquiring well bred horses of rarer bloodlines. To get
good stock, and to learn as much as we could about the breed, we went on repeated trips back to
Quebec - the heartland of the Canadian Horse, and where the majority of
Canadian Horses still remain today.
We tried to see as
many "typey" and traditional examples of the breed as we could.
During our search we
had the good fortune to meet many individuals
who were instrumental in the breed's history and preservation. These folks
kindly helped us on our learning curve about the breed.
In Quebec, we carefully picked out the young stock
that would form the basis of our fledgling breeding program, and ultimately transported
them home ourselves.
Throughout
this learning process, the breed continued to impress us with their sturdiness
and soundness, as well as their sociable and calm natures.
Our farm continued to grow, with our acquiring several stallions, and a small
herd of quality broodmares.
Ultimately, this allowed us to
produce a small number of quality foals which gained us the reputation of
producing healthy, good natured, well handled babies of rare bloodlines.
To our pleasure, our "Cherry Creek" foals have gone to wonderful homes located
all over Canada and the USA. You can see photos of some of these foals and
where they have gone, on the foal pages for both
Zipper and Fonzie.
Eventually, our young stock
matured, and this then enabled us to be able to do a wider variety of things with
them.
Eventually we trained them to both
ride and drive. Although we had never driven horses before having
our Canadians, we found them
to be so inherently well adapted to this discipline, it seemed a logical step for us to
take it up.
We have had tremendous fun with our
Canadians driving carriages in the summer, sleighs in the winter, and entering
Combined Driving Events, for which they seem particularly well suited.
As our horses matured, we began to spend more and more time with them,
under saddle. Most recently, we have been showing a number of them in
dressage.
Throughout the past 5 years, we had a great year working with, training and
showing our horses, and in particular, our stallions. Our stallions
continue to do very well in both open and breed competition, winning a variety
of prestigious awards (see news page for
updates).
Our increased focus on our stallions has lead for some changes in our breeding
program in that we have decided to take a break on the foal production end of
things. However we continue to stand our three stallions and offer full breeding services with them.
We are thrilled with the foals that our stallions have produced - many of which
are show champions in their own rights. Some of their offspring can be
viewed on each of our stallion's pages.
We have also been focusing our
efforts on training the youngsters that we do have for
sale.
All in all, we find our Canadians to be sensible,
intelligent, quick learners, and that they really want to please. They tend to
be a horse that "thinks first" before reacting, as opposed to other horses that
we have dealt with in the past who would react first and (maybe) think later.
They are easy keepers, and have such excellent feet that they usually require no
more than routine trimming. Versatile and adaptable, they happily do whatever we
ask of them, be it riding, driving, working around our farm, or just
"schmoozing" with the many visitors to our farm.
Needless to say, we
love our Canadian Horses and can't say enough good things about the
breed!
