California Riding Magazine • February, 2009

Kilkenny Crest
Oregon sporthorse breeding and sales endeavor recruits Rich Fellers as show rider.

by Kim F. Miller

Kasi Boyd making faces at Celtic.
Photo: Ashly Adams Photography

The amount of down time at hunter/jumper competitions is something many show parents complain about. Not Sherry Boyd. When her daughter Kasi was coming up the junior ranks, Sherry used the time to observe the scene carefully, to dream a little and then to plan. She knew that Europe has geographic advantages over America as a sporthorse source but she also knew that, if done right, domestic bred and raised horses could more than hold their own against the imports.
Fast forward many years and it’s a 17-degree day in December at Sherry and Doug Boyd’s Kilkenny Crest, LLC, a 155-acre sporthorse breeding and show jumping training facility in Bend, OR. The water pipes are freezing and it’s dang cold to be out and about feeding and caring for Kilkenny’s many horses, but the proprietor couldn’t
be happier.

Kilkenny’s foundation sire, the retired jumping star Kilkenny Jasco, is thriving in his post-show career. The conversion to green energy sources for the farm is nearly complete and Rich Fellers has signed on to ride a string of Kilkenny Crest horses. These include Kilkenny Rindo, with whom Rich finished second in a November $25,000 Grand Prix in Los Angeles and who may get a shot at a World Cup class or two at Thermal.

Rich Fellers riding Santa Teresita Fantasma

Snagging Fellers, reserve champion at last year’s World Cup Show Jumping Finals, as a competition rider speaks volumes for the breeding and sales business’ place in the equine world. His predecessors include 1986 WEG champion Gail Greenough and Olympian Buddy Brown. Both also served as resident trainers at Kilkenny in the past. Canadian Olympic gold medalist Eric Lamaze, American gold medalist Will Simpson, Richard Spooner and Joie Gaitlin are a few other top show jumpers who’ve been more than happy to campaign the Kilkenny horses over the years. “I feel really fortunate that a lot of great people have enjoyed riding our horses,” Sherry comments.

In the 10 years since Sherry bred her first horse, Kilkenny Crest has sold homebreds and prospects throughout the United States and Canada. Regular campaigners at Spruce Meadows and the West Coast’s top venues throughout that time, Kilkenny has earned loyal clients through word of mouth and return customers. Although Sherry describes the Kilkenny breeding endeavor as relatively small, Rich notes that “no expense has been spared in producing great horses.”

Kilkenny Jasco first came to Kilkenny Crest as a jumper. The 16.2 Dutch Warmblood arrived with impressive jumping and dressage lines. His sire Vasco did double duty in Europe, rising to success at the highest national levels in both disciplines. Courageous, careful and scopey, Jasco proved his abilities in North America with numerous Grand Prix successes, including a Sunday Grand Prix win on the Indio circuit before retiring to his life at stud. In addition to this handsome copper-colored stallion, Kilkenny Crest also breeds regularly to other familiar names. At the moment, Sherry has youngsters by Judgement, Mescalero, Lexicon and Air Jordan, and will expand that to include a Consul foal this spring. Paired with mares of equal quality, most notably Kilkenny Lesandra, these stallions are filling the sporthorse pipeline with a regular flow of great American-bred prospects.

Temperament Trumps All

The bloodlines vary, but every Kilkenny horse shares the common denominator of a great temperament. The farm’s website is filled with testimonies from owners raving about how much fun their horses are to be around and to train. That is particularly true of the Kilkenny Jasco offspring. Kilkenny’s Mindy Castaneda is a 25-year veteran of the equine industry and says she has never worked with a smarter horse than Kilkenny Jasco. His reproductive veterinarians, Dr. Lisa Metcalf and Dr. Trish Kentner, have equal praise for his disposition. “My staff, mare owners and vets alike, are always delighted to work with Jasco,” the veterinarian reports. “Not only is his semen quality outstanding, but he is such a gentleman in the breeding shed.”

Nature has a lot to do with producing great temperaments in horses, but nurturing is essential too. Sherry’s background makes her uniquely qualified for this aspect of the breeding process. She has a PhD in nursing research with an emphasis on family and child development. “In my research in early parent-child relationships, I did a lot of looking at what helps a child have a good self-concept and how to develop that,” she explains. “I’ve been able to apply that to our young horses. We work with our foals from the beginning so that they truly trust you and feel good about themselves.”

Sherry had thoroughly enjoyed her career as associate dean for graduate studies at the Oregon Health Sciences University. When the school’s Dean went on sabbatical, Sherry took her place temporarily with the understanding that Sherry would then take a sabbatical of her own. That time off with the horses, however, became the end of her tenured faculty position. “They should have never let me go,” she laughs. “We all kept thinking I’d get over this!” Managing a breeding and sales business is neither simpler nor easier than managing a team of PhDs, she adds.

Photo: Ashly Adams Photography

Having Rich as Kilkenny’s show rider is the source of much excitement at the farm. Throughout the last nearly 20 years of his private trainer/rider arrangement with Mollie and Harry Chapman, Sherry has watched Rich make the very most of the horses he’s developed. “I’ve never seen anybody get more out of a horse,” Sherry observes. “He loves his horses and they love him back.”

When Rich became available to ride other mounts, Kilkenny Crest jumped on the opportunity. From his own facility in Wilsonville, OR, Rich began working with a string of Kilkenny horses last summer and their progress is already evident.

Kilkenny Rindo is the stable’s star so far. “I liked him since the first time I jumped him,” says Rich. “He’s energetic and super fun to jump with lots of scope.” The Jasco daughter Kilkenny Tupelo may become a real hot shot soon. Started over fences only recently, the mare is “super careful and very quick,” Rich reports. Kilkenny Wallace is another to watch. She’s a Jasco filly out of Kilkenny Lesandra, with whom Gail Greenough had qualified for the Pan Am Games selection trials for the Canadian team. The mare had a very bright future until complications from a severe colic took her life. Happily, she left two youngsters and a granddaughter behind.

“They are super horse people,” Rich confirms of Sherry and her staff at Kilkenny Crest. “They’re great about having a plan for developing and marketing each of the horses they are bringing along.” He’ll be showing off the Kilkenny horses at Thermal, weeks II through VIII. After that his campaign will be determined by whether he qualifies for the April World Cup Finals.

Horses not yet ready for the big time show circuit are brought along at home by talented local trainer Sara Katz. “She’s a great rider that we’ve known for a long time,” says Sherry. She’s a lucky rider, too, to get to school horses on Kilkenny Crest’s first-rate training base. Spacious, beautifully footed arenas and a derby field with natural obstacles are just a few of the amenities that facilitate the under-saddle continuance of Kilkenny’s confidence building emphasis for its young charges.

Gone Green

In addition to producing great horses, Kilkenny Crest has made a big commitment to using environmentally friendly energy sources. Soon the farm will be operating off the grid, as well as selling some power back to its local utility company. Solar panels and wind turbines provide electricity and hot water to what look like traditional, old-fashioned barn structures. Going green hasn’t been easy, Sherry comments. “As much as the government says they want to push it, getting this through the permitting phases is quite a process.”

The Kilkenny Crest horses are sterling examples of the green movement’s emphasis on eating locally-grown food: Their hay is harvested on an 80-acre plot adjacent to the farm. “We got tired of buying hay in large quantities and often having 10-20 percent of the hay being not so good,” Sherry explains. “When Kilkenny Crest sells hay we guarantee it as marketed – superb!”

The care, thought and love invested in every phase of their horses’ lives have enabled Kilkenny Crest, LLC to make quite a name for itself in the North American hunter/jumper market. Despite her obvious affection for all her horses, however, Kilkenny Crest is a business, Sherry emphasizes. “Every horse on the farm is for sale.” Thanks to the way these horses were raised, they leave Kilkenny Crest with high likelihood that they will be equally treasured by their new owners.

For more information in Kilkenny Crest, LLC, visit www.kilkennycrest.com.