Elm Grove Jackanory

[helen1983]

Having finally decided on a breed for my new arrival, meet Elm Grove Jackanory (Jack).



He's a 4 year old, 16hh Saddlebred that Sally has had her eye on for a while...he's a shy boy but he loves to be fussed (and secretly, Sally loves to fuss him). She's hoping that she can train him for dressage though at the minute, she's happy just to bring him on slowly.

I think he's the catalogue 'Storm' AQH and I bought him from Jen, he's got nice soft black hair but having looked at other similar greys they have lighter manes? So I'm thinking he may be rehaired at some point. My friend had posted about taking her new horse to a show yesterday, he's a grey called Jak, and the name 'Jackanory' just popped into my head!

[abbeymore]

Aw! He's lovely. Look at that face, you can tell Sally is scratching just the right spot!

[elli]

Storm was in the catalogue for a long time and did vary a bit (as did some of the other catalogue models who were available for a long time, I've got two of 'Topsy' that were made years apart because they're completely different colours!) but one of the things he did have was a mane described in the catalogues as 'salt & pepper', as it was mixed black and white. Sometimes it got more striped and sometimes it was very much mixed. He also didn't have the socks like that. I'd guess that he might have been just a spare, rather than an actual 'Storm' - Jen is most likely to have bought him new (wouldn't swear to it but generally she bought a lot of her horses direct from Julip) and she won't have rehaired him. He's lovely whatever though

[george]

I don't think he is a Storm, not only the lack of white hair you mentioned, but he's much more speckly making him look a darker shade of grey, and he has those two white socks. I'd say they're original, not added later by his owner, because he doesn't seem to have any black shading on his knees, which means his lower legs were left unsprayed on purpose - cos the painter knew they'd be adding socks on when they did the hand-painting part of making him.

[edit : Elli got there before me ]

[helen1983]

Thank you both! Interesting to know he's not a catalogue, I saw a couple next to each other and how they varied slightly but yeah, he's quite a bit different isn't he! He's in lovely condition, I think Jen said he was around eight years old? What colour would you describe him as? I'm umming and ahhing whether to get him rehaired or not because I'm unsure as to what you'd call the speckled grey (the flea bitten ones I've seen are like brown freckles almost?) and whether or not the black 'matches' as such. (Not that I'm too het up about perfect breed colours and stuff, just wondering )

[george]

I'd probably go with calling him a roan - that suits the dark mane and tail, and also the black on the sockless legs. To be completely true to a roan, he ought to have a darker whole head, not just toward the muzzle (like this nice clear ref pic www.whitehorseproductions.com/images/horsecolor/roans/blueroan_eddie_eyed_hancock1.jpg ), but with the black points he does have, he's still far closer to matching roan than real fleabitten greys, which hardly ever seem to have black legs and a dark mane and tail - unless they're also dappling out with a blacker rump as their baby dark coat changes to an eventual white-grey with speckles.

[helen1983]

Oh I see! You can tell it's been ages since I've done anything with real horses I forgot about blue roans as such! He'll be impressed now he's got an actual colour, rather than me just going 'erm...grey...spotty...sort of'

In other news, he now has a very smart green headcollar with nose padding (delicate little tall thing )

[kits]

He looks lovely Helen I like Jak for short too! I think he'll look good all tacked up for dressage.

[Dantelsh]

He looks lovely does new boy Jak