As this is my first blog for H&H, I thought it best to start with an introduction. My name is Sacha Shaw, and together with partner Andy, we breed Trakehners and coloured sport horses under the banner of Volatis Stud.
Twelve months ago we decided the economy in the UK was looking very depressed, so decided to put our lovely broodmares out on loan, and move to the centre of the Oldenburg breeding region, in North Germany, to be able to experience first hand how and what the Germans are breeding.
And so we now both work at the Schockemohle stallion station, myself based with one of the show jumping teams, and Andy currently with the breeding team. It has proved to be a perfect location to get to stallion licensings, foal shows, and auctions of many of the major studbooks, such as Hanoverian, Westfalen, Trakehner and of course Oldenburg. Over the next few months, I hope to share some insights into these events.
On a personal note we have very recently started making plans for the 2012 foal crop, with some mares being covered in the UK, but we have also brought two young home-breds over to Germany. The first is a three-year-old colt by Showmaker x Stanhopes Dueka, called Volatis Defiant — or ‘Jack’ — who I am going to back and school over the summer before deciding if we want to retain him as a stallion prospect. He certainly raised a few eyebrows when he arrived as I don’t think the Germans were expecting quite such a colourful horse to appear off the lorry.
The other horse we have brought over is our young Trakehner mare Volatis Casiphia, ‘Casi’ (Tycoon x Achtermann). As well as starting her education, she has just been covered by one of the resident stallions here — Fürst Romancier (Fürst Heinrich-Romancier). She is due to be scanned this week, so by my next blog we’ll know if we are expecting the first 2012 Volatis foal.
Until then,
Sacha
