WOF Bill’s Lil Darlin’

Certified Mare

DOB: November 9, 2011

Height: 14.3

Color: Silver Black (E/e, Z/n, nd1/nd2)

2023 Trail Miles: 173.9

Meet our boss mare. Darlin’ is a been-there-done-that sort of mare. She’s the first one we put visitors on and is about as safe and calm as you can get. She’ll tolerate just about anything as long as you’re scratching her under her chin or across her chest. She was Stephanie’s primary trail horse while Squirrel was growing up. She’s completed hundreds of miles of trails all over the southeast and will do any obstacle you put in front of her without fear or hesitation. In addition to trails and obstacles, she’s herded cattle, taken excellent care of special needs riders, packed in equipment for sawyer teams, and she’s a certified search and rescue horse. Most recently, she’s been involved in Cowboy Mounted Shooting competitions - Mark is competing on Darlin while Riddles is out with maternity leave.

Our journey with Darlin’ was different as she was the first Rocky we brought to the farm that had already been started under saddle. She’d had a few years off raising babies, so when we got her to the farm in 2021, we started with basic groundwork and then progressed to riding. It was evident in the first riding session that she didn’t move the way we thought a Rocky should move. She’d clearly been trained for gait with a performance mentality. She stepped big, but with a hollow back and strung out nose. Quite honestly, it wasn’t very comfortable for human or horse. She was the first horse we had to retrain for gait and it was this process that really showed us that it was much more challenging to retrain muscle memory than to get it right from the beginning. While it took a bit longer, she helped us see that any Rocky can become a comfortable, Daisy Clipper trail horse.

Darlin’ is an amazing mama. She’s attentive without being overbearing and has no problem letting us handle her babies. She throws beautifully correct foals with wonderful personalities and great gait. Squirrel, her second foal, is a perfect example of this. Darlin’ recently weaned her 2024 filly, Miss Maudie Mae (by CF’s The Hustler). We will be spending the spring and summer putting her back on the trail and polishing all of her extensive buttons. She will be available for a new home in the fall of 2025. If you’d like to learn more about her, or meet her as a potential match for you, please reach out to let us know.