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Thursday, July 17, 2008

Dogs, Cats, Horses and a Happy Couple

By Harold Smith
Mountain View Telegraph
      Odds are Ken and Cherie Wallin — owners, breeders and raisers of racehorses for 25 years — do it mainly for the fun of it.
    But it's hard to tell who is enjoying the Wallins' time- and money-consuming sideline the most — the married couple of 36 years or the assorted characters that traipse about their ranch. It's only about a furlong or so from the site of the planned racetrack and casino, north of Interstate 40 in Moriarty.
    At the Wallins' spread, there are kittens, who, one is warned, are on the prowl and could pounce on your ankles at any moment.
    Then there's Fats, the dog, a border collie with a probable bit of Australian shepherd in him. He darts in and out of the corrals, ordering the mares and colts around as if he owns the place.
    "Our pet crow isn't here today," Ken said with a chuckle during a tour of his place on Monday. "He comes around every once in a while. He'll let my wife go right up to him. She'll talk to anything."
    The Wallins' stud quarter horse — Lordly Way, a 5-year-old sorrel who stands at about 15 hands (about 5 feet, 1¼ inches) as measured from the withers — has fun, too.
    The only mammal there who didn't appear altogether happy was BB Me Thru, a rather stoical fellow.
    "As of (July 9), he's a gelding," Cherie said.
    The Wallins have stuck with their avocation through its many ups and downs, including the untimely loss of Wellborn Manor in 2001. The horse died of colic after he, it is surmised, somehow turned himself upside down in his stall at Ruidoso and damaged his innards when he tried to twist out of it.
    "He was a very good horse," Cherie said. "He was one of the rare ones. When he died, I didn't know if I wanted to do it anymore. Then, another time, we had a colt where the mare refused the baby. But you get over it as soon as another one is born."
    "Wellborn Manor was always in the running for first or second," Ken added. "And he was New Mexico, born and bred."
    The increase in purses via the sharing of slot monies, instituted to help in-state owners, aided the Wallins.
    "In the mid-'80s, it was like $800 for a purse, a $1,200 purse at Santa Fe," Ken said. "Then when the racino began, we got 25 percent from the slots. The purses increased by 10 times from what they were before. A New Mexico-bred runner that stays in New Mexico gets award money."
    Out-of-state owners quickly took note.
    "All the people from Texas started shipping their mares to New Mexico stud farms. They'd sit down there for 120 days, and if you were lucky, they'd get bred. So now, I have my own stud. I primarily do quarter horses now with my own stud (bought three years ago). If they don't get bred, it's my own fault."
    The move of the Downs at Albuquerque to Moriarty will also be a big development. Construction is scheduled to begin this fall with a goal of opening sometime in 2010.
    Though Ken likes the idea — it will improve the area's economy, something he said folks around here have sought for a number of years — he emphasized that Moriarty will never be the same once it arrives.
    "But Moriarty is the right place for a track," he said. "Albuquerque is horrible. You can't even find a place to park your trailer. But it'll be a change here. My home will be right across the street from it. Some of the retirees in our neighborhood are throwing a fit. They moved out here to get away from the growth. The land prices are already going up."
    Ken, a co-owner of Wallin Construction Co. and Moriarty Concrete Products, and Cherie have about 20 head, most of which are currently stabled at Ruidoso Downs for the summer racing season.
    "They're all — four 3-year-olds, seven 2-year-olds and two older horses — at the track to run (with assigned jockeys) …," he said. "The money's in the gambling. That's why they wanted (the slot money). I didn't think it was good at first, but it's the best thing that's happened to us. It's enabled us to stay in it. But I've been in a dry spell for about two years."
    Ken and Cherie tried working with thoroughbreds for a while.
    "My wife and I do it all, but we just have quarter horses now," Ken said. "Thoroughbreds are a job instead of a hobby. They'll hurt you. They're so high-strung. I'm getting too old to fight them. Until they're 3- and 4-years-old, they're a handful. I prefer the quarter horses."
    Cherie — wearing work gloves as she led their prize mare, Dancing Manor, a former Clovis Classic Futurity winner, and her colt, Pretty Girl — is the doting matriarch of the Wallins' equine kingdom.
    "I try to be there for all of their births," she said. "Some naturally get through it, and with some, they need help. We've lost very few. The babies up to yearling is what I love. I say goodbye when they get to yearling and go off to training. They're like teenagers then."
    Ken and Cherie aren't the only ones in the area in the racehorse game.
    "There were a half dozen of us a few years ago," Ken said. "Now, there's probably 50 of us in the Estancia Valley. Lonnie Vaughn, he probably has as many racehorses as I do…. They're also opening up some farms around Edgewood with a lot more horses than I have."
   

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