Well this horse deserves his own novel. Donated by Follydown Stud to a charity auction for an endurance family @ Bendemeer Ride I went to the ride with a plastered 4 week-old broken wrist, rode 80km, and then purchased Rishahl FA sight unseen for $500, with the added bonus of 1.5L of red wine signed by someone famous (no-one knew who LOL) and a hand-made lampshade (which I still have). I went to get him as a weanling and it was the start of a whole new crabbet world meeting Jenni and Toni from Follydown and Jen Hawkins from Shahwan Park. Coincidentally the Aunt of the family we were raising money for was June Petersen and she had owned the farm directly across the road from me here in Wootton before I moved in. She’s a legend in endurance and represented Australia internationally 7 times and also won numerous Aussie rides. I ride on the tracks she trained on.
Rishahl FA had been nicknamed “Rissole" by Tony Thompson and I had to keep that name. He is still known as “Riss”. We had 3 foals before gelding him and breaking him in. He was always a very laid back boy. He grew up here out with the herd of mares and geldings in an 80 acre paddock and served a few mares when he was about 3-4 y/o. He had four foals for me (3 colts/1 filly). We gelded the colts and lost two in different fencing/paddock accidents and the filly was rejected by her dam and also lost despite all the best veterinary care at the time. His one surviving son, Wootton Audacious, has been residing with a good friend in QLD for a few years but is coming back to Wootton in 2017.
I offered Rissole as a ride to a young girl, Amelia, who was a friend of a friend. I knew she could ride and she’d recently lost her long-time pony. She rode Riss at his first Pony Club outing just after he’d been started. My main desire at the time was that she would “get the crabbet bug” and she’d be addicted like the rest of us. I think I can safely say that’s happened. She now owns his only son, Wootton Audacious, aka Digger as well! Photo credit: Glyn Parry from GeoSnapshot.
