By DANNY BUTTLER
LIKE selling snow to Eskimos or sending coal to Newcastle, breeding Welsh ponies for the Welsh would seem an unlikely deal.
But Tooradin pony breeder Wendy Trimble has done just that, selling a Welsh Section B Pony to one of Britain’s most respected studs.
Houston – the foal who will be sent to the UK as a colt at the end of next year – was bought by the Welsh breeders after an exhaustive search of Australian studs.
“It was very flattering – it was the last thing I thought would ever happen,” Wendy said.
In a show of support for the breed, young Houston was sold at a lower price than he would have fetched had a local breeder bought him.
The reason behind the discounted sale was mostly altruism, but partly marketing.
“The breeders who have bought him are one of the top breeders in the UK and they’re really good at promoting and showing,” Wendy said.
“If I was selling him in Australia I would have charged more (but) you can see what they are trying to do and it will improve the breed.”
Just why Welshmen would need to travel to Australia to re-energise their own bloodlines is rooted in a 1970s export/import boom that saw some of the best breeding stock in the world sent from Heathrow to Tullamarine.
“Back in the 1970s it was very inexpensive to import into Australia, so a lot of ponies came over, whole plane-loads arrived and were sold on when they got here,” Wendy said.
“So we have got a lot of the very good bloodlines and now back in the UK they are missing that link.
“They have gone on so far and they need some of that blood back … they didn’t realise what they were doing,” she said.
With partner Shane Bysouth, Wendy runs 40 ponies on her picturesque property and would love to have more if time and money allowed.
But until she wins Tattslotto, Wendy will keep her day job at Faceys Nursery, the family business started by her father Rex Trimble in 1959.
When she’s not at the Devon Meadows nursery, however, Wendy is focused on the business of breeding and promoting her beloved ponies.
“They have a great temperament and are very obliging, they’ve got a real character to them,” she said.
“They are very friendly, a bit of a show-off and they have a bit of attitude about them.
“Children can start off on the Welsh mountain pony because it is smaller and then, as they grow, they can graduate to the Section B and then later on they go on to the bigger ones if they want.”
