Jason Rutledge

Nice features of you in the DHJ Summer 2009 page 97. I enjoyed it and have two calls from a folks saying did you read abut the suffolk that won the pull. Hope you have a nice summer. We are still very dry going on 22 months now here.

Rodney,

Well, we didn't write the title, because in reality Chad Miano had won the pull about three years earlier when he won the contest, as he has a pair that were bred here on Ridgewind Farm. They are all related to the Marshland Punch horse that was imported from England by the Grants in Canada. They were hybrids and actually got by all the teams that year including the heavy weight horses. The heavy weight teams really don't like it when the lightweights pull more than them. As also mentioned in the article, Chad Miano got by my son Jagger Rutledge pulling the same team of Tong and Wedge two years ago by four inches on 14,000 pounds in mud. So a Suffolk team had already won Ferrum twice, but it was a nice article from the perspective of horses can pull very hard and be competitive without being like "pulling horses". It was just the first we had ever won this big local pull after 29 years of competing.

The biggest difference for us is that we work our horses and don't just pull them, so we can't deal with horses that only know one thing. They have to be well rounded as well as stout. I was influenced by a mentor many years ago named Donald Alpaugh that sold me my first pair of pulling ponies (1974). He didn't believe in doping or shocking animals and held high regard for horsemen that performed without those treatments. This is the ethic we practice and promote also.

We are just getting our first hay making weather for the season and are shuffling bales into the barn during this clear weather window in what has been the wettest spring early summer we have ever had.

One thing is for sure, weather seems extreme everywhere, regardless of the type of weather.

Thanks for reading the article, as anyone that has been interested in Draft Horses knows, we are very dedicated to the Suffolk horse.

There will be about a dozen working at the Southern Draft Animal Days event, in the woods and fields. We will have a friendly invitational pull there on Saturday night too.

Y'all come on down on Sept 18-19th. See the ad in Rural Heritage Magazine. Thanks for the support of this community of interest.

Sincerely,

Jason Rutledge

What kind of person would dope or shock such a wonderful animal? Isn't it illegal?

Jason

Too bad we do not live closer to you. I would love to have you work a few of my gelding.

Thanks for all you do for the Suffolks

Thank you for that comment Rodney.

We have a long history with the breed and have enjoyed working with them for decades.

Hope to see you in Tennessee and for ASHA to have a Suffolk booth there.

There will be several Suffolk teams there.

Jason