The deaths of Cabaret and his band is a tragic and sad event. Cabaret and Duchess have no offspring left on the range. Duchess has no more related horses to pass on her genes.
In the wild, the horses do not have time to dwell on death. They have to move on and concentrate on the present and future. Cabaret and his band will always hold a special place in my heart. We have to remember that they remained free and lived on the range their whole lives, even though their lives were cut short, they were free.
So today I am going to talk about Cabarets full sister, who is very much alive and well on the Pryor Mountain Range. She is the daughter of Looking Glass and Sequoyah.
Her name is Gold Rush. She is a beautiful dun with a white star, connected snip and stripe and a white right hind pastern.
Gold Rush was born in 2006 and stayed with her father, Looking Glass, until he lost his entire band to two different stallions. Two Boots and Duke.
Half of Looking Glass’s band went with Duke and the other half went with Two Boots. Sequoyah and her daughters Gold Rush and yearling Hanta Yo (she died as a 2-year-old) went with Two Boots.
Two Boots was almost Twenty years old at that time, but he still managed to keep his family of duns. In 2008 Sequoyah had a foal, a dun filly with a round star, named Inian Kara. Then in 2009 Gold Rush had her first foal, a sooty dun filly named Juneau.
The only horse that was removed from Two Boots band in the 2009 round-up was Sequoyah’s yearling filly, Inian Kara. She was with Flint’s (Blue Moon) band at that time. I hope that they will not take any of these young horses this year. They are exceptionally beautiful and it would be good if their bloodline could continue.
During the winter of 2009-2010 Gold Rush and Juneau were stolen by a dark bay stallion named Doc.
That spring Gold Rush had her second foal, a beautiful dun filly with a very faint star, named Ketchikan (Two Boots is the father). She is a beautiful filly. She was so sweet and curious when I saw her in August (2011).
In August of 2010 Doc lost his mares to the very dominant stallion Baja (he is Cabarets half-brother!). You can see Baja in action in several of my videos (see links below). Watch for him, he is the very impressive dun stallion with the two toned mane.
August 2010 was a very active month. I was there for a few days that August and I got to witness first hand the unrest that seemed to be going on. That was the month that Ferdinand took Flint’s (Blue Moon) band from him. We will talk more about the handsome grullo stallion, Ferdinand in another post. I think the horses knew that the winter of 2010-2011 was going to be a hard one and it seemed like they were trying to make their bands as big as they could.
In the early spring of 2011 Doc recovered Gold Rush. Later that spring Gold Rush gave birth to her third foal (Doc is the father). He is a bay colt with a big star and a white right inside coronet. His name is London.
I was excited to see London when my daughter Amber and I were on our way to the pond one stormy evening, late in August (2011). Doc and his little band were grazing in a small meadow along the road. I had last seen Doc in October of 2010, he was alone then, now he had his band back, and a new son.
We stopped the truck and got out. London saw us immediately and came over to investigate. Doc stayed pretty close watching his son carefully, but letting him explore on his own. We were there for a while, enjoying the interactions of his band. As Doc’s family moved on, he stayed for what seemed like too long, still eating. His band was almost out of site when he finally trotted off to join them. I hope he can hold on to his family this time. I think he needs to be a little more attentive.
So I am telling myself today to move on. I think that some days will probably be easier than others, but I am looking forward to watching this next generation grow old on the mountain.
A special thank you to my blog partner, Alex for providing me with the detailed history of Gold Rush, and also to Tony Wengert for the use of his photos of Looking Glass!
