THE path from birth to the sales ring is fraught with hazard for horse and breeder. The list of things that can potentially go wrong is endless and sometimes, no amount of attention to detail, round-the-clock surveillance or five-star care will prevent one setback or even disaster occurring.

So getting to the intended sale is an achievement in itself, although even that means nothing if your charge is making the return journey home with you.

Of all the steps along the way, vetting is among the really crucial ones. When Ken Parkhill takes my call, he is just readying his team of 13 intended for the Tattersalls Derby Sale next week, as they go through the final steps of being green-lighted for attendance at Fairyhouse.

When we touch base later on Tuesday evening, another hurdle has been cleared without a hitch.

“You’re never sure with the vetting,” muses the proprietor of Castletown Quarry Stud. “You could go up to the sales with what you thought was the soundest horse in the world and he could get a little knock going up in the box, or he could blow a bit funny on the day, maybe get a bit excited or maybe get a little cold or something. The vetting really is paramount for us. Once you’re through the vetting, you’re half-way there anyway.”

Ken, his wife Louise and sons Peter and Nicky are carrying on a family tradition that goes back a couple of generations.

“I was reared in it. My grandparents were in it, both parents were in it. There was no escape for me, even though I did veterinary. The horses was always going to be my number one.”

Marshall and Emilie Parkhill bred Champion Hurdle winners Morley Street and Granville Again. It was surreal when Jimmy Frost booted the former up the famed Cheltenham incline in 1991, but when his full-brother repeated the trick two years later, everyone sat up and took notice of High Board and her dalliances with Deep Run.

The irony is that racing had never been the focus of attention for the Trim-based clan.

“The Champion Hurdles were great but we’re relatively new into thoroughbreds,” Ken explains. “My roots were really sport horses. For example, the day Morley Street won the bumper in Sandown – that was his first win – we didn’t even know he was running. The technology wasn’t there, but we weren’t really into it that much. We grew into it.”

TRADITIONAL TWIST

Parkhill is very proud of that history of success and the traditional sentimentalist in him is determined to keep it alive, but he is a shrewd businessman too and allies his emphasis on the proven with modern trends to ensure that his stores are in demand when it counts.

“A few old bloodlines have been very good to us, bloodlines that were started by my parents. I have put myself under a good bit of pressure to try and keep fillies. At times you’d be cursing fillies when you get filly foals but they’ve been good to us down through the years.

“Number one is to try and keep the old bloodlines alive. There are three or four families that we’ve had for generations. It’s important to me to keep them alive, and then maybe try and get into one or two new families and get them going.

“We keep a good few broodmares and we kind of try spread it out. We try cover the best mares with the best sires and aim them for the sales. Then we try and support the other stallions that are starting off and hopefully we might be a little bit ahead of the posse if some of those hit the jackpot.”

It is a combination of science and luck trying to get in early on a stallion. Study or gamble? Perhaps a studied gamble.

“You watch the sales and see what’s selling and keep away from what’s perceived to be – and I emphasise perceived to be – dead in the water. That’s the biggest thing.”

Former stars of the shed can make a comeback but it’s rare. The irony as far as Parkhill is concerned is that often, they never stopped producing but fell out of favour anyway. He is bemused how fickle people within the industry are and how quickly they lose faith.

“There are horses getting heaps of winners though being passed by people that don’t even want to see them and that baffles me.

POLARISATION OF SIRES

“The biggest difficulty right now is the polarisation of the sires. Everybody wants Flemensfirth and so on, the few top lads. There’s a French influence as well that doesn’t add up to me. There are people buying French horses by sires that were never heard of and they’re passing up on the Irish ones that are proven. I really can’t understand what’s happening with that.”

In all, Castletown Quarry has a band of 25 broodmares and at any given time in the year is likely to have in the region of 80 horses around the farm, from foals upwards. While most of their stores are homebred, Parkhill does pick up the odd foal that catches his eye too. He is always on the lookout for a nice filly, but will go for a good-looking foal too with a slightly weaker pedigree if the price is right. It makes for a busy year, which to date, has gone reasonably well.

“The fillies we have leased with Willie Mullins went well. There are a few nice fillies down there to run in the next little while as well.

“The Land Rover Sale went okay… it probably could have gone a little better, but it was not too bad.

“It’s nearly all year around. You might get a little bit of a break in July but then you’re into the August Sale and then into the yearlings at the back end. Peter has a bit of interest in the flat so he keeps a few flat yearlings. That’s his baby. I’m not involved in them.”

Louise holds a trainer’s permit and they kept a few of the fillies in training for a number of years in a bid to get them some good blacktype before going breeding. It was difficult to combine with all the other activities around the farm though and while Peter still breaks a few yearlings and they do a lot of pre-training, the Parkhills send their fillies to Closutton now. Many of them are leased by Supreme Horse Racing Club.

It was notable that when Zuzka won a Kilbeggan bumper on her racecourse debut four years ago, that Patrick Mullins praised Parkhill for the manner in which the mares leased from him were prepared. Zuzka went on to win a Grade 3 hurdle at Leopardstown at the end of the year, with subsequent Cheltenham Mares’ Hurdle victor Glens Melody in her wake.

Daring Carlotta won three bumpers, Pearl Diamond another and Myska was successful in her first three starts, including a listed contest in Taunton last December.

“Willie’s a great trainer. It doesn’t always work out. There are sad days as well as good days but it has worked fairly well.”

Central to that is the gradual beefing up of the racing programme for fillies. The €5,000 bonus offered by the ITBA for 74 races in a season has been a significant innovation. Weatherbys have added their weight in terms of sponsoring mares’ bumpers and the number of blacktype races specifically for mares has increased on both sides of the Irish Sea.

“I’m very pleased that the programme for fillies is getting much, much better and that’s down to the hard work of the Thoroughbred Breeders’ Association and people like that. They’re doing Trojan work.

“When people are going for leading owner, the top boys, there are so many big races now for fillies, they need to have them. A few years ago some of the top trainers and owners, they’d vomit if you mentioned a filly to them. Now they have plenty of them and that’s a good thing.”

The trend, and the provisions puts in place to bring it about, is positive for the industry in the broadest sense.

“When you’re breeding, 50% of your stock is going to be fillies and if the fillies are worth nothing, then it’s not much of a business model.”

Even with that though, there are challenges everywhere in this industry. Right now, the market is incredibly competitive. And there are other problems coming down the line too Parkhill warns.

“It is very competitive and you can see the signs of it already now when you go to try get a mare covered this year. It’s very difficult to get into the fashionable sires. There’s huge numbers of mares being covered this year and I think we’re going to be back into over-population and over-production soon again.”

There is no real way of addressing this problem he reasons.

“The market controls it. When the thing is good everybody wants broodmares. When the thing is bad nobody wants broodmares and numbers get down again but I don’t think you can legislate to control it.”

On these pages a couple of weeks ago, Colin Bowe noted that it cost him an average of €30,000 to €40,000 to buy good stores, which he would hope to win with on the point-to-point circuit and sell on at a profit. That is good news for vendors but the pool of operators on Bowe’s level is quite select and insufficient on its own to sustain an entire industry.

“There are a few of the point-to-point lads that have had a phenomenal year but they’re obviously in a position to splash out a few quid. It’s so difficult to compete. And there are no new people coming into it. That’s what worries me really. You’re depending on a few top men.

“Then if you take the Land Rover Sale, very few trainers actually bought horses – certainly Irish trainers anyway. There were probably enough small lads from England. It’s not simple now, at any level I don’t think.”

SUPERSTITOUS

Even in the most professional of operations, superstition plays a role, albeit tiny.

“When we got married we bought a little place and Castletown was the address. But sure there were a hundred Castletowns. There was a quarry just beside it so just as a kind of a once-off, we entered animals under Castletown Quarry. We were lucky that time and we just stuck with it.”

Ken admits that the family involvement adds to the enjoyment of the good days but is anxious to highlight the role of his “invaluable” staff too.

“On a cold winter’s morning, when it’s wet, it’s not always the most glamorous place to be, but they’re always there. It’s a good team.”

And right now, they are focussed on next week and as ever, cautious optimism reigns.

“There’s a very nice filly I bought by Shantou, she’s out of a half-sister of L’Ami Serge (Milanella), and there’s a Milan filly out of a half-sister of Morley Street (High Ace)– they’d be two fillies I’d be hopeful for.

“Then there’s a lovely big Court Cave horse, from the family of (Grand National winner) Corbiere, he’s a half-brother to Araucauria. There’s another Court Cave horse out of a half-sister of Morley Street again, Victorine. She’s bred a few winners, so I’d be hopeful for him too.

“I suppose then the most topical pedigree is there’s a half-brother to Myska and Daring Carlotta. I’d be looking forward to him.”

It’s a snapshot of all Ken and the team at Castletown Quarry do well and work hard on. The hope now is that the rewards will come.

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