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I am Heather Stopher and this is my wonderful and
much loved horse Goldie, or ‘Good as Gold’ to give him his full
name.
I started with horses when I was 7 and went on
until I was 17 before being forcibly ejected from the family nest
into a hard and cruel world to earn a living. My sister,
brother and I were lucky enough to have some really good show ponies
when we were young which we produced from home and did quite well
with them. |
Savina and Goldie |
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Sister Karen on ‘Prince Apollo’ and me on ‘Weston Fascination’ at
home in Barton, Bedfordshire c.1966. |
So began 33 years of globetrotting. I used
to dream of hacking in the English countryside with the wind in my
hair and it was this dream which drove me on. I decided at 20
that I would retire at 50 and return to horses. I set about
climbing to the top of everything I did. I needed money, lots
of it and I am afraid that I pursued this course relentlessly
without a backward glance throughout my working life.
At varying times I have owned sports cars, a
part-share of a glider, and a powered aircraft. These were
expensive enough to run, but little prepared me for the horrific
expense of running a horse! |
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On April 8th 2000 I duly retired (well, I did
do a bit of consultancy work for a couple of years after that)
and bought ‘Finnigan’ a six year old 16.3hh liver chestnut Irish
hunter for a considerable amount of money. Several things
hit me at the same time, the first being that I hadn’t got the
faintest idea about anything despite the years of research that
I had done beforehand. Secondly, all the experience of my
childhood counted for absolutely nothing and I had a hard time
believing that I could not just get on this horse (bareback if I
had wanted to) and gallop it around the countryside like I used
to do. The horse frightened the living daylights out of me
and broke two fingers to boot. I was in way, way out of my
depths.
I sent him off to Polly Hodges, who was one
of the Junior British Dressage Team riders, to be schooled then
to Nick Turner’s yard to be jumped, loaded and prepared for sale
to give him the best chance of going to a good home. I
regret to say that I was pleased to see him go. I look
back on that episode now and feel dreadful about it. I
failed that horse and Lord knows where he is now.
My next venture was ‘Chance’ a 14 year old
16hh chestnut ID/TB mare whose Sire was the ‘King of Diamonds’.
She had a hunting injury and was sent to me on loan. I got
on so well with this horse and loved her to bits, unfortunately
10 months after she arrived we were out hacking one day and she
stumbled as we were cantering up a hill. She nearly went
down but pulled up hopping lame. Her sesamoid bones had
finally crumbled and there was nothing to hold the deep flexor
tendon in place. She was put down at Oak Farm a few hours
later and I was devastated.
Next was ‘Nemo’a 16hh dark bay 20 year old
branded Danish Warmblood Intermediate Dressage horse with 4
white socks. Nemo was fantastic and we roamed a good deal
of Bedfordshire until he developed an abscess on his pedal bone.
It was inoperable and would render him lame for the rest of his
life. So I went about looking for yet another new horse to
ride.
I had placed an advertisement in Horse &
Hound in the ‘Horses Wanted’ section asking for a m/w 100%
bombproof hack for a geriatric rider that might do the odd
hunter class at a local show. In amongst the million or so
replies to my ad., the sellers of Goldie contacted me.
From what they told me I was not very interested as there was a
price tag of £3.5k, but there were several horses in the Bucks
area that I was interested in so decided to include a
visit to the dressage yard as well.
To cut a long story short, I saw this
enormous, ginger and white, grossly fat, clumping horse, with
the biggest backside in history, squashed into a 12' x12'
stable, with his ears back and plopping his bottom lip in a
pathetic sort of way. He was surrounded by dainty
thoroughbred types which emphasised his hugeness. I can
honestly say that my heart beat faster and I loved him the
moment I saw him. |
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I had him test ridden by my niece and my
sister-in-law (who was very scathing about his conformation,
upright shoulder and his choppy trot) then 5 stage vetted by
Baskervilles. He was found to be one fifth lame on flexion
on one hind leg. The attending vet said that, in his
opinion, this should not affect him for what I wanted to do with
him. So, after a spot of renegotiation, I loaded a £2000 Goldie
into my horsebox on my Birthday, 8th April, 2003 and
drove him back to Oak Farm.
A week after Goldie came home, my niece, Savina,
decided she wanted to jump him so we entered him into a local
show. He flew round and came away with firsts in working
hunter, ridden hunter, the hunter championship and she also won
a jumping competition. This set the trend for the summer
of showing and jumping, culminating in the epitome for me, a
first against the 2002 Wembley winner in the working hunter
class at Ashwell. I began to wonder what his background
was. |
Savina and Goldie at Ashwell |
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At this stage I knew nothing about his
background and nothing about his previous owner’s accident.
She told me it was an ‘old injury’ when I enquired as to why she
was swaddled in bandages from head to foot. She was also
reluctant to give me information about his previous owners, so
when it was apparent he could jump I contacted the BSJA who came
up with a match and I was able to contact a very relieved Louise
and thus trace his background.
Goldie is a 12 y/o 16.11/2
hh. KWPN x ID/TB. His dad was the famous Grade A
showjumper ‘It’s the Business’ and his mum (supposedly) a Grade
B showjumper by the name of ‘Libby’. Goldie’s Mum’s real
name is still unknown. Despite all efforts, I am still
not further forward in finding out what her real name is despite
repeated requests to his breeders. I can tell you though
that she is a 17.1hh dark bay elegant mare with a white snip on
her nose. She seemed to be a nice kind horse with a soft
eye when I met her.
Goldie was bred at the High Offley Stud in
Staffordshire, and the story goes from his previous owners that
'It’s the Business’ escaped from Geoff Glazzard’s farm next door
and covered several High Offley’s working mares one night.
High Offley did not deny it when I asked them. Goldie’s
Sire can be seen on
highoffleystud.co.uk. where he is still covering their
mares, so they must have been pleased with the results!
Goldie’s resemblance to his dad is nothing
short of remarkable. In common with his Sire, whom I have
been to see, Goldie had a wonderful tractable temperament until
such time as the blood is roused and then all hell is let loose
in one go. He is a horse of very definite contrasts.
Goldie was broken at 3 and kept entire until
he was 5 by High Offley Stud who showjumped him and, when he did
not progress beyond Grade C, they gelded him and started to show
him in Working Hunter Classes. He excelled in this sphere
and won pretty well everything in the Borders area. When I
visited High Offley Stud earlier this year, I was shown into the
office where framed pictures of Goldie still adorn the walls.
It was a bizarre sensation seeing my own horse as a youngster
decorating someone else’s premises.
Louise Garbett from Shropshire saw him
competing and wanted him for her daughter Lindsay. So
Louise duly bought him. Goldie was showjumped, hunted and
shown for 4 years winning many County standard classes and even
the Supreme Championship at Birchinley Manor in Scotland, named
the ‘Wembley of the North’. His former owners are having a
copy of this win on DVD made for me. (I am SO excited!).
Lindsay went off to University and Louise had
to sell Gold. He was sold to a woman in Buckinghamshire
who had just lost her CB/TB. Within a very short space of
time she had fallen off him and cracked her ribs and broken her
arm and shoulder. She never rode him again. Gold was
sent to a dressage yard to be sold which is where I found him.
Until October 2003, Gold and I hacked all
over the Bedfordshire countryside together in complete harmony.
Something happened to us in the second week of that month and we
got to the stage when he was mostly disinclined to stop from a
canter/gallop when requested to do so. This state of
affairs was not helped by a stupid girl from our yard galloping
past me when I had specifically asked her not to do so.
Once more we arrived in the yard a little quicker than
anticipated. I began to get anxious and look for excuses
not to ride him.
Enter Heather (Hev) Seems. Hev was
teaching someone at Oak Farm and out of curiosity I began to
watch. Hev then started me and very quickly afterwards
disappeared to Devon. From Hev, I found the Parelli
system. Within weeks, and before I had even got my Level 1
pack, I then found this Naturally Horses group and was welcomed
and encouraged into the group by
Liz. It seemed that everything happened at once
leading me to believe that my journey with natural horsemanship
had already been mapped out for me and was clearly meant to be. |
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