In preparation for a horse show on Saturday, 7Jan12, Nevin McQuarrie came to our ranch and put on a clinic for our riders and horses on Friday, 16Dec11. The show is part of the 2012 Arizona National Livestock Show. The Peruvian Paso Classes are all on Saturday, 7Jan12, starting at about noon at West World in Scottsdale, Arizona. All of the activities for the Arizona National Livestock Show can be seen on their web site at www.anls.org. If you want to see the Peruvian Paso Class schedule on the ansl website first open “Horse Show”, then open “Rules” and then open “Saddlebred Show”. This will take you to the Saddlebred Show schedule which includes Peruvian Paso Classes.

Pictured below is Nevin McQuarrie at the clinic on 16Dec11 with from left to right: Becky Chase & BBC Sirocco; Effee Conner & WF Prodigio; Kaitlin Kaiser & BBC Anica; and Morgan Conner & BBC Ariana. Also showing on 7Jan12 will be: Bill Chase & RDD Querecotillo; Morgan Conner & BBC Centauro and Nevin McQuarrie and both BBC Evita & BBC La Sombra En La Luna. Thanks to Nevin McQuarrie and Good Luck to all of our horses and riders!!

Two more of Caballos De BBC’s young horses made their show debut at the multi-breed Southwest Cactus Classic on 17Sep11. The Open Gaited Breed Classes were being judged by the Honorable Doug LaSota, a nationally carded Peruvian Paso judge. The five year old stallion, RDD Querecotillo, was exhibited by Bill Chase in Open Halter where he took 1st place of 6 horses and in Open Two Gaited Novice where he took last of 5 horses. After the Novice Class Bill Chase said he was happy, “just to be on the horse at the end of the class”. Querecotillo had never been in an arena at night under lights and the moving shadows in the corners were really scary to him. The other first time horse, a five year old mare BBC Anica, had no such problems. She and her rider/trainer Kaitlin Kaiser took 2nd in the Open Two Gaited Novice class and 3rd in the Open Halter class. Fantastic job Kaitlin!

Caballos De BBC had four more horses entered in the show. They included the seasoned stallion BBC Sirocco being exhibited by Becky Chase and Morgan Conner and the seasoned gelding WF Prodigio being exhibited by Effee Conner and Kaitlin Kaiser. This was Effee’s first time showing a gaited horse and she said she had a great time. She did a real nice job handling and riding the horse. Look for her at future shows. Kaitlin Kaiser rode Prodigio to his second ever blue ribbon by winning the Open Three Gait class showing off Prodigio’s beautiful canter.

Nevin McQuarrie brought BBC Evita back for her third show in style taking 2nd of 5 horses in Open Two Gaited Horsemanship and 1st of 5 horses in Open Best Gaited. Last, but certainly not least, Morgan Conner brought BBC Centauro back for his second show and won two firsts and a second in their three riding classes. Morgan and Centauro took 1st of 5 horses in Open Two Gaited Horsemanship, 1st of 5 horses in Open Two Gaited Novice and 2nd of 5 horses in Open Best Gaited. After their first show in March at the Carousel Charity Horse Show we said to watch for Morgan and BBC Centauro to be winning in the future, and they surely did. Way to go Morgan!

Thanks to all of our exhibitors. The horses and riders looked great! Since all of us were busy handling and caring for horses we only have a couple of picture to share. Here are a couple of halter pictures and one of Kaitlin Kaiser riding BBC Anica in the warm-up arena.

Thanks to Glenn Davis, the founder and driving force behind the Southwest Horse Soccer Association, we acquired a soccer ball and introduced it to some of our horses to play with in June of 2011. Since then our horses have been “having a ball”, as you will see in the pictures below. If you find you are interested in your horse playing with a soccer ball go to the web site for the Southwest Horse Soccer Association at www.southwesthorsesoccer.com. There you will find loads of information about horse soccer as well as a hot link to a company that sells horse soccer balls. I recommend you get one and “have a ball” with your horse. Ours absolutely love it!!

Carousel Charity Horse Show, March 2011

The 2011 Carousel Charity Horse Show featured 31 horses from Arizona and California competing in 36 classes specifically for Peruvian Paso Horses. Our ranch brought 4 horses, two of them seasoned show horses, BBC Sirocco and WF Prodigio, and two of them new to showing, BBC Evita and BBC Centauro. All of the horses and riders did well.

Becky Chase took home the top honors with a Reserve Champion Performance Stallion title on BBC Sirocco!! Way to go Becky!! She also looked elegant riding BBC Sirocco in the Ladies to Ride Class, which with a total of 10 horses was the largest Peruvian Paso class of the show.

Kaitlin Kaiser rode WF Prodigio in the two Junior classes against a tough field of riders and horses including the current National Champion Junior. Prodigio started out slow finishing last in the Junior Equitation class but then came back strong finishing 2nd in the Freestyle Showmanship class. The Judge really liked Kaitlin’s 2 minute routine, including gait and canter work. He was especially impressed with Prodigio’s beautiful canter. Very nice job Kaitlin!!

Nevin McQuarrie showed BBC Evita in this, her second show and had her looking good. She was competing against seasoned show mares and showed very well, finishing 3rd and 4th in Mares Gait and Breeding Mares with 5 horses in each class. After the show Nevin remarked how well Evita had worked for him for only her second show. “She really stayed with me”, he said.

Morgan Conner brought BBC Centauro to this his first show. He really did well, especially considering all of the new things he had to deal with: being away from home, living in a fully enclosed barn and showing in a covered arena under lights at night. All of those things were new experiences for him. While he made some mistakes, as any Novice horse is going to do, the Judge really like him and told Morgan that he is a nice horse with lots of potential. Morgan has done all of the training with BBC Centauro and has done an excellent job. Good work Morgan! Watch for the two of them in future shows, they are a winning team.

Congratulations to all of our riders and horses! Here are a few pictures from the show including three by the show photographer, Howard Schatzberg.

BBC Evita Makes Her Debut In Style - September 18, 2010

The American Saddlebred Association of Arizona presented a mutlibreed horse show at West World on September 17 & 18 of 2010. While the show did not have any classes specifically for Peruvian Paso Horses, it did have several classes open to any gaited breed. Three horses competed in these classes, and all on them belonged to Caballos De BBC. They were: our stallion BBC Sirocco ridden by Morgan Conner, our gelding WF Prodigio ridden by Kaitlin Kaiser and our mare BBC Evita ridden by Nevin McQuarrie. Both the stallion and the gelding had been to numerous shows before and had been ridden in prior shows by Morgan Conner and Kaitlin Kaiser. BBC Evita had never been show before. Congratulations are in order for Nevin McQuarrie and BBC Evita as they won all three classes they competed in against our other two more experienced horses!! And both Morgan Conner on BBC Sirocco and Kaitlin Kaiser on WF Prodigio did excellent jobs presenting their horses. There were several classes that could have gone either way. But the day belonged to Nevin McQuarrie and BBC Evita!! Congratulations on a tremendous debut!

Summer Volunteer Help Complete Groundwork Exercises - 13Aug10

Melodie Riedy and her daughter Savannah Parish volunteered to help at the ranch for three weeks this summer. Savannah lives in Arkansas and was visiting her mother who lives in Surprise, AZ. They found our web site and contacted us to see if we could use some volunteer help for a few weeks before Savannah returned home in mid August. We set up a program for them to work with two of our geldings grooming the horses and doing Clinton Anderson’s ground work exercises three mornings a week. Savannah worked with our 16 year old gelding CCF Cimarron and Melodie worked with our 6 year old gelding BBC Centauro. We lent them Clinton Anderson’s 4 DVD set on “Ground Work For Respect” along with his book, Downunder Horsemanship.

It was an intensive course getting through all 17 ground work exercises in a little over two weeks. Even though both of these horses had done most of these exercises before, it is still much harder to actually do than it looks on the DVD’s. Melodie and Savannah would study a couple of the lessons at home on the DVD’s and then come and try to execute them with our horses. Bill Chase helped with a few pointers but mostly they worked it out by helping each other and referring back to the book during their lessons. Savannah is really looking forward to going home and using her new found knowledge with her own horses. As a special treat for her diligent work, Savannah was given two lessons by Bill Chase in riding Cimarron before she left for home. While Savannah is an experienced rider she had never ridden a gaited horse before. By the second day she was not only gaiting on the rail but doing circles, figure eights around cones and serpentines through cones, all in gait. As Savannah left the ranch to go home, she said some day she wanted to own a Peruvian Paso Horse like Cimarron. Attached are several pictures of Savannah Parish riding CCF Cimarron.

Southwest Classic Multi-Breed Horse Show - 2May10

On May2, 2010 our ranch had two horses entered in six classes at the Southwest Classic Multi-Breed Horse Show at West World in Scottsdale Arizona. The show featured classes for a number of breeds including three gaited breeds: Peruvian Paso, Paso Fino and Tennessee Walking Horses. All of the gaited breeds were judged by the Honorable Douglas LaSota who is a nationally carded Peruvian Paso Judge.

The show included six specific Peruvian Paso classes. Morgan Conner exhibited our stallion BBC Sirocco in Open Performance (3rd place), Stallions Breeding (2nd place) and 100% Gait (1st place); and Kaitlin “Katie” Kaiser exhibited our gelding WF Prodigio in Zootechnico (3rd place), Open Performance (5th place) and 100% Gait (2nd place). We were very pleased with how well both Morgan and Katie did exhibiting our horses for us. Everyone present we spoke to enjoyed the show and the excellent officiating by Douglas LaSota. Following the tradition of Peruvian Paso judges, Douglas LaSota elected to ride the three entries at the end of the final Peruvian Paso class which was the 100% Gait Class. We were delighted that he placed BBC Sirocco first and WF Prodigio second after riding them. Here are some pictures from the show.