In the fall of 2003 we said good-bye to one of our stallions, Northern Drifter, and sent him on his way to warmer climes with JLM Ranch in sunny California. We had been breeding Drifter to Tim’s daughters for four years at that point and had a new crop of beautiful fillies that we wanted to keep for brood stock . But since they were daughters of Drifter and also granddaughters of Tim, the time had come to bring along some new blood.

That year we headed south to Kentucky in search of Drifter’s replacement. We knew the bloodlines we were looking for. Our favourite two stallions from the “sons of Tobe” are Clemon’s Tim and Sewell’s Sam. Since we already have a son of Tim, we set out to look for a colt with Sewell’s Sam lineage.

Of the second generation stallions from Sam, there were (in our opinion) none better than Carl Vivian’s Buddy Roe. Years earlier when we were first getting started in the breed, we had visited with Carl and Wanda and met Buddy in person. The word “awesome” is grossly overused these days, but in this case it applies perfectly... Buddy Roe was awesome. We sat and listened as Carl, in his quiet Kentucky drawl, told us his stories about Buddy. The one that always springs to mind is of how Buddy was trained haul logs down from the ridge behind their home.

Working at the top of the ridge, Carl would hook Buddy up to a log and start him off down the hill toward the yard. Watching from the kitchen window, Wanda would periodically check to see if he had arrived. On his own, Buddy would pull the logs down from ridge and stand patiently in the yard when he got there, waiting to be unhitched. When Wanda spotted Buddy arriving with his load, she would slip out and unhook him, tie the traces up over his back and send him back up the ridge to Carl. All by himself, this breeding stallion would spend the day hauling logs home from the ridge. If ever there was an example of the intelligence, willingness, trust and placid nature that we treasure in the Rocky breed, Buddy Roe was it. It is also no small testament to Carl Vivian’s skill as a breeder and trainer.

When Buddy passed away, Carl and Wanda received cards of sympathy from people all over the country who had met and fallen in love with their wonderful stallion. While looking for colts in Kentucky we were thrilled to find out that Carl had a grandson of Buddy Roe (by Hammertime) for sale that year. Hammertime is the gorgeous, chocolate son of Buddy that Carl kept to replace him after his death. And he is made in his father’s image.

We arrived at the Vivian’s and spent some time getting to know the little colt that Carl had christened “Jim Bob”. (“Don’t spend much time on the names,” he explained, “people always change it after they buy ‘em anyways.”) After meeting the colt Carl suggested that we should “take his daddy for ride” and brought Hammertime from his stall. Outside I mounted up, expecting to run him up and down the lane, but Carl moved toward the gate leading to the mare’s field.

“I’ll open the gate and you can take him down along that hollow,” he said, pointing to the far end of the paddock. “There’s a path in there follows the crick bottom on down to the fence.”

Looking at the field full of mares and sitting on a breeding stallion, fresh from his stall, I suggested another route. “That’s okay Carl, I can just ride him here along the driveway.” Carl seemed to ignore what I’d said and, without changing his tone simply repeated: “I’ll open the gate and you can take him down along that hollow. There’s a path in there follows the crick bottom on down to the fence.” I got the feeling that if we wanted to buy Hammer’s colt, this ride wasn’t optional.

Through the gate, down the field, along the creek and back again. Past the mares in two directions and finally standing amongst them back at the gate, Hammer never cast so much as sidelong glance anywhere except where he was pointed. The mares could as well have been on another planet; under saddle this horse was all business. Not to mention that he was a gaiting machine! Across the rough pasture and climbing the ridge Hammer never broke stride or, as Carl said, “That horse ain’t got no trot or pace in him.” This was Buddy Roe’s heir!

BABY PICTURES: Jim Bob (left) and Cross Bo as weanlings in Kentucky. What's not to love?

If we’d had any doubts about purchasing Jim Bob they were put to rest with that experience. We made arrangements for shipping and a month later JB and Cross Bo arrived to join the herd here at Havenwood.

Which brings us to Cross Bo, who is pretty well-bred little guy in his own right. I hate to make him seem like an afterthought but, in truth, he sort of was. We had already settled on JB when we spoke with Sandy McCart and found out that she also had a stud-quality colt for sale that fall. Several years ago, Colleen spent some time working with Sandy and has kept in touch. When we saw this colt at her farm near Harrodsburg, Colleen and I both had the same reaction... “oh look, he’s got a chest!”. We had spent a lot of time during that week being shown colts so narrow through the front end that it looked like both legs were coming out of the same hole! Being used to the broad-chested offspring of Timmy, some these babies looked positively anorexic to us. Both JB and Cross Bo had a nice span to their chest as babies and are developing into deep chested adults.

While we had really only intended to bring one colt back with us that year, when we saw Cross Bo it was pretty hard to leave him behind. It didn’t take long for us to convince ourselves that having three stallions might be pretty good idea and would give us more flexibility in our breeding program and a wider range of bloodlines to offer clients. Besides which, he was cute.

JB will be turning two in April and Cross Bo in June. It looks like JB will be the taller of the two, he’s nearly 14.2 hands now. Cross Bo is currently 14 hands tall and will likely finish around 14.3, while JB will be 15 hands or a little better. We’ll be putting them under saddle early this summer so, if they are certified in time, we may do some late breedings with them and have their first babies on offer next year. We have no doubt that they’ll both make spectacular daddies!