Improving on the Best: Vessels Stallion Farm

There’s a simple answer to the question of how to raise better horses: follow a management program that has proven to be successful, and then take each step to the next level. Simple, however, doesn’t always mean easy. Considering each aspect of an equine operation— land, breeding stock, personnel, and management—and making each part the best it can be is a daunting prospect. Nevertheless, Vessels Stallion Farm, home of outstanding Thoroughbreds and Quarter Horses, is a model of this plan.

Vessels Stallion Farm sits on a 2000-acre expanse of land about 35 miles north of San Diego in southern California. Formerly operated as a cattle ranch, the broad valleys and rolling hills are fertile but dry. When the family bought the property in 1983, Frank “Scoop” Vessels III authorized a system of underground sprinklers to distribute well water over sections of the land, enabling the establishment of green pastures in a region where most horses usually don’t have the luxury of grazing fresh grass.

Scattered across the emerald expanse are a large stallion barn with adjacent turnout paddocks, a spacious breeding shed, and a foaling barn with roomy stalls. Other barns provide housing for broodmares or for young horses being weaned, prepped for sales, or trained for racing. Round pens, hot walkers, and exercise yards give way to expansive turnout areas that border a training track where budding racehorses are given a glimpse of their future. In this area of sparse rainfall, it’s hard to gauge the importance of the green fields in this farm’s overall success. Do young horses grow better when they can stretch their legs in exuberant gallops over turf-covered hills?

The answer might be hard to prove, but it would be hard to  argue against this “back to nature” management plan. In the highly competitive horse industry, it’s tough to get to the top, and almost impossible to stay there for any length of time. Concentrating on one breed would seem like the best way to achieve outstanding results, but Scoop Vessels has achieved enviable records with not one but two racing breeds. The farm boasts stallions, broodmares, and young stock of both Thoroughbred and Quarter Horse blood. The family’s interest in the Quarter Horse line was first established with the purchase of Clabber, a stallion acquired in Arizona by Scoop’s grandfather, Frank Vessels, Sr. The stallion was bred to a group of mares, some with Thoroughbred bloodlines, bought in Louisiana more than 50 years ago and shipped to California, which at the time was not a hotbed of Quarter Horse racing. The elder Vessels worked to promote racing, successfully lobbying for the legalization of pari-mutuel wagering and building interest among owners and racing enthusiasts. His son, Frank Vessels, Jr., was next in line to carry along the venture.

Scoop Vessels continued the family legacy with the purchase of a Quarter Horse colt, First Down Dash. A son of prominent racing sire Dash For Cash, the colt was named Champion Two-Year-Old and Champion Three-Year-Old in his early racing career. Following a victory in the 1987 Champion of Champions Race, First Down Dash achieved the title of World Champion. With track winnings totaling $857,000 and 13 victories in 15 starts, the horse retired to begin a breeding career. His first foal crop produced a winner of the All-American Futurity, the richest event for racing Quarter Horses. The young sire proved that success was no fluke when his offspring also claimed victory in the prestigious race the following two years.

After establishing this unprecedented trio of wins, First Down Dash was syndicated and went on to become the leading all-time sire in Quarter Horse racing, producing 29 national champions and three world champions. His record stands as the first and only Quarter Horse stallion whose progeny have reached the $50 million mark in total earnings.

Vessels Stallion Farm is carrying on this top bloodline by standing two sons of First Down Dash. Fishers Dash, foaled in 1993, ran the second-fastest 440-yard time of any two year- old in the nation and was in the money in five of eight starts. Retired to stud in 1997, his daughters include Hardly Hateful, Champion Two-Year-Old Filly of 2004 and winner of almost $437,000 in her first year at the track. Dash to Chivato, a 1996 full brother to Fishers Dash, won the Southern California Derby (grade 1) and the PCQHRA Derby (grade 2) before beginning a career at stud.

Splash Bac, another Vessels stallion, boasts a record of five wins and three second-place finishes in ten racing starts, credentials that boosted him to the title of Champion Two-Year-Old Colt. He has sired two world champions (Canada), two regional champions, and 137 winners including 25 stakes victors with total earnings of over $3.5 million. Buccaneer Beach, stakes winner and Champion Aged Gelding in 2004, is a son of Splash Bac.

In the early 1990s, Vessels Stallion Farm was looking to acquire a promising Thoroughbred stallion. The right horse came along in the form of In Excess, an Irish-born Eclipse Award nominee and winner of close to $1.8 million at the track, racing on both dirt and turf. In Excess has had an exemplary stud career, earning the title of leading freshman sire in 1996. He has produced nine California champions and many stakes winners, and his get have earned more than $22 million to date. Among his more famous racing sons and daughters are Indian Charlie (1998 California Horse of the Year and Champion Three-Year-Old Colt) and Excessive pleasure (2003 California Champion Three-Year-Old Colt and winner of over a million dollars).

Another of the farm’s fine Thoroughbred stallions is Apollo, who is lending his speed to Quarter Horse bloodlines. His daughter One More Habit recently won the grade 1 $232,900 Los Alamitos Winter Derby final, and son Old Habits was the 1999 Champion Three-Year-Old Gelding.

As of last year’s racing season, Devon Lane, a 1993 son of Storm Cat, had sired 46 Thoroughbred winners for earnings of well over $2 million, as well as 12 winners on the Quarter Horse circuit with earnings of more than a quarter-million dollars.

Another Vessels stallion is Momentum, a 1998 son of Nureyev, who recently ended a racing career in which he finished in the money in 13 of 17 starts. Momentum will join Apollo and Devon Lane in bringing Northern Dancer blood to the Vessels stallion barn. A last young stallion, Jackpot, is by Seeking the Gold and out of Frolic, a full sister to the successful Claiborne stallion Out of Place. Jackpot raced through his six-year-old season and, like Momentum, is only starting his career at stud.

These young horses have been carefully selected to carry the Vessels winning tradition into the future. According to Rich Decker, Vessels Stallion Farm owns about 120 broodmares, approximately half of which are Thoroughbreds and half are Quarter Horses. Counting mares that are shipped to the farm for breeding, foaling, or other reasons, the resident broodmare count is usually around 400. The farm points all of its young horses toward the yearling sales, Decker said. Vessels animals have brought top dollar at sales in recent years, often leading the day’s sale prices.

Decker understands the many details that must be considered in the course of a breeding season. He explained that, in order for a horse to be registered as a Thoroughbred, the mare must conceive from a live cover, so Thoroughbred mares are shipped in for breeding. Quarter Horses, on the other hand, may be produced through artificial insemination or by embryo transfer, so the farm’s reproductive center offers cooled shipped semen by contract. All offspring of First Down Dash, in fact, result from artificial insemination rather than live cover. Embryo transfer, a somewhat more complicated procedure, involves flushing an embryo from a mare’s uterus early in the pregnancy and implanting it in the uterus of another mare who then carries the foal to term.

The resulting foal is eligible for registration as the offspring of the first mare, although this horse may have long since returned to racing, showing, or another career, or may even have been rebred to produce multiple embryos in the same season.

Decker and the other staff members bring valuable experience to their jobs, and all their skills are needed to keep the large and complex operation running smoothly. Some, including Decker, have college degrees, but all would probably agree that years of hands-on work with the horses is at least as valuable as any classroom learning. “It takes a lot of people, and a tremendous amount of time, to handle the various horses every day,” Decker said.

“Other than the pedigrees of the sire and dam, nutrition is one of the most important, but often overlooked, factors in allowing a foal’s genetic potential to come through,” Decker commented. “We have been very pleased with the service provided by Associated Feed. The professionals at Associated Feed and Kentucky Equine Research have gone out of the way to be sure we have the consultation and products to keep our horses in good condition. I feel they have definitely improved our overall nutrition program.” Recent research has pointed out the impact of feeding practices on proper skeletal development, and Decker said the rate of metabolic bone disease has decreased among the young horses at Vessels Stallion Farm since KER’s recommendations have been in place.

Producing the best horses may well involve an element of chance, but luck can be helped along by planning, innovation, and attention to detail. Improving the land, acquiring premier breeding stock, building an experienced and capable staff, and following expert nutritional advice have moved Vessels Stallion Farm to its position at the top of the equine industry.