Archie
Slick By Design X Escape the Drama AQHA Colt Born: April 26, 2020 Owned by Chris Thompson and Jeffrey Pait Career Goal: AQHA Performance and Performance Halter
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rchie, a black Quarter Horse colt was bred to run, jump, stop and turn. At six weeks old, he certainly seems to know this. He enjoys galloping around his pasture at Pait Show Horses on Aiken’s Southside where he was born. He has a proud and self-assured personality coupled with an athleticism that bodes well for his future as a performance horse. Most of the horses that are bred at Pait Show Horses are destined for the AQHA halter ring, but this colt has performance lines. His dam, Escape the Drama, earned an AQHA Register of Merit in Hunter Under Saddle. She was also named an AQHA Superior Performance Halter Mare and won Reserve World Champion Amateur Hunter Under Saddle Mare. His sire, Slick by Design, is a barrel racing champion who holds the record for the fastest time ever run by a stallion in the National Finals Rodeo. The colt will spend the summer at the Pait farm, learning his first lessons in being handled for his future career. Exactly what discipline he will specialize in will be up to him. Will he be unflappable and steady, a hunter champion like his dam? Or will he have the fire and speed to break records in barrel races? He could be a bit of both: Quarter Horses are known for their versatility, their ability to compete in several disparate disciplines without skipping a beat – perhaps he will be the next AQHA All Around Champion. Wherever his talent takes him in the future, he is getting a good start here in Aiken, which is becoming known as a breeding ground for horses of many breeds.
Valkyrja from Meant to Be Farm
Nafnleysingi from Meant to Be Farm X Vanadis from Azur Icelandic Filly Born April 19, 2020 Owned by Meant to Be Farm
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alkyrja was born this spring at Meant to Be Farm in Aiken. She is a purebred Icelandic horse, a breed that is not common in the United States and quite rare in Aiken. Icelandics are gaining a following here, however, and for good reason. They are smaller horses, averaging about 12-14 hands, and they can be three, four or five gaited, able to perform a walk, trot, canter, tølt, and flying pace. These last two are ground-covering lateral gaits that are very smooth to ride. This makes four and five gaited Icelandics an excellent choice for people who looking for comfort, while the fact that all Icelandics also have a distinct walk, trot and canter means they can also compete in the standard English and Western disciplines. They tend to have kind, safe and sane temperaments, too. Valkyrja’s sire, Nafnleysingi, is also on the property, as are several of her other relatives. Juli Cole, who owns and operates the farm, has been breeding Icelandic horses for many years, and has recently also started crossbreeding Icelandics to Appaloosas in order to produce a horse with Icelandic traits and Appaloosa coloring. Her breeding program is very scientific: she sends out her horses’ DNA to be analyzed for various traits, especially for the genes that determine whether or not a horse is gaited, so she ends up with few big surprises.
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The Aiken Horse
Juli says that her future plans are to train Valkyrja for competition and pleasure riding, and eventually to enter her into the breeding program. “Her first few years will be spent playing with her sibling, due any day now, and learning the age appropriate basics as a foundation of her overall training. But mostly playing and being a horse!”
June-July 2020