This is Hideaway Spotted Sparrow, or simply, “Sparrow.”

Last spring, we talked about our next addition to our herd.  We knew we wanted to add LP to our color matrix to complete our Gypsy Horse rainbow.  Adding LP would mean we had at least one horse on the farm with every single GVHS recognized color and pattern identifier (and most of those not GVHS recognized also).

It couldn’t just be any horse with LP, though.  It had to be a horse with the size, conformation, pedigree, and visual characteristics that we were looking for.  It needed to be a horse with a bit more than just varnish or a slightly spotty bum.  She needed to be LP with a pattern, too.  While I was fine with the idea of a fewspot, my other half frowned on the idea of us having one more white horse (of the two of us, along with our groomer, she does more of the grooming).

Our primary full-sized herd sire stallion, Mason, had a dam that was LP out of the Indigo’s Royal Knight line.  We really liked that line (and we really loved his momma, Indigo’s Royal Lil’ Alexandria, when we had met her), but as our stallion was from that pedigree, that cut out some of our options.  It was likely to be a Hermit’s pedigree horse due to the number of them in the breed or it could have been an SD horse if the right one came up.

We took our time on this decision.  There were many options.  There were many lower-cost options that didn’t really check all the boxes for us.

I’m a bit of an obsessive stalker of the Gypsy Horse markets.  I watch many different horses that are seeking new pastures.  Most times, I can tell you which horse would be my next horse if I were forced into purchasing a new horse (not that you would have to force me too much to buy a horse at any moment in time given the capability to do so at that time).

Over several months, I had procured a list of potentials.  I wasn’t finding exactly what I wanted.  I put out an ISO call, and I was buried with responses.  Nothing scratched the itch.  In the end, I had my top list of contenders, so I went over them with my other half.  She made the decision, and she said something like, “Why didn’t you tell me about her?”

“I thought you didn’t want another mostly white horse?”

“Yeah, but she’s pretty.  That gray mane, those blue eyes.  She’s the one.”

And she was in foal to Starfire’s The Monarch.  Icing on the cake, since we do like our duns also.

She needed to move fast, though.  She was 2000 miles away in California, and she was due near the end of May or early June.

She arrived on our farm around the 9-month pregnant mark in April of 2024.  We’ve worked with a lot of transporters and we’ve done some transporting ourselves, so we have a lot of admiration and respect for the transporters in this industry and we know some of what they have to deal with.  Big Horse Express was fantastic beginning to end.

Sparrow was a gorgeous horse.  She had more mane and feather than her sales ad had shown (it may have been a bit aged).

She took her time with acclimation, though.  Those first few days, she spent a lot of time at the fence line pining to be with the other horses.  She was lonely.  Some horses are fine being alone for short stints.  She wasn’t one of those horses.

As herd animals, we believe that horses are psychologically better off when in a herd.  We quarantine, but it’s very difficult for us to maintain that like we know that we should sometimes.  This was one of those times.  She was very pregnant, needed to acclimate into a herd, and needed to spend more time eating than standing along the fence line.

Sparrow’s quarantine was cut short, and she made her first friend on the farm, our mini buckskin Gypsy Horse, Honey.  I found out from her prior owner that her prior best friend there had been a shorter buckskin mare also.

April came and went.  May nearly came and went when she delivered a strapping little bay colt at the very end of May (more on him later).  She was a great mommy for a first-timer.  The only hitch for her was a trip to the vet with a placenta that had been retained a bit too long that needed expert help to remove.  It was cleanly and fully removed, though, and all was smooth sailing after that (with some flushing, antibiotics, and re-checks as precautions).

Her little boy was a bit of a piggy, though.  We have a set amount of time that we go before we wean our younglings.  For the sake of his mommy, he was weaned just a few days early to help her recover from lactation duties.  He was a butterball, and was eating hay and grain just fine, so it was time for both.

She had some time in with a stallion over the summer, but she didn’t take by midsummer, and, since she was a little bit tired out from being a first-time mommy, the decision was eventually made that she would be left open for the winter.

She’s spending this winter with one other mare that didn’t take this past summer, two new mares that were acquired later in the year than we like to breed (so were also left open), and a two-year-old (now nearly three) that was too young for breeding this past summer.  Sparrow is the lead mare in her pasture of five open mares.

Honey was pregnant, so, even though they were buddies, Honey is spending the winter with her husband-horse and the other mare placed with him.

Her new best friend is our nearly-three-year-old, Phoebe.  They’re sort of frenemies.  Phoebe has a funny personality.  She doesn’t allow other horses to boss her around much.  She doesn’t have a lick of aggression in her, but she seems immune to the bossiness of other horses.  She’ll approach and feed with another horse, and then when they push her away, she’ll take a few steps away, circle, and then approach from the opposite direction.  She’s persistent.  Because of that wily persistence, she has forced herself into Sparrow’s heart.  The two are most often seen together with another one of our larger, newer horses, Munchkin, parked around a bale together (while the other two in that pasture mostly avoid that trio).  Phoebe floats, though, and hangs out with those other two when she’s by herself, so that makes Munchkin Sparrow’s other friend-horse.  When Phoebe’s not by her side, Munchkin is.

We have plans to breed Sparrow again this coming season.  We’ll see how she does as a mother in 2026.  If it is taxing on her, it might be her last foal with us.  Some mares just aren’t meant for the rigors of being a mother.  If it comes to that, we’ll find something else for her to do.  If she handles it well in 2026, we will be very deliberate in deciding which years she needs off and which ones she can be bred.