Time,
and the burning desire to ride nice horses, has allowed
us to develop our own start to finish program here
at the farm. We have evolved to a point where we
love to show what we have raised as products of our
stallion Three Dimension Zip.
The horse that initially got the program started was a stallion
called Frosty Zipper. "Doug" as we called him,
was a 16 HH sorrel who, as a three-year-old, earned his Superior
in Western Pleasure and placed 7th in the Millers Ltd 3-year-old
Hunter Under Saddle Futurity at the American Quarter Horse
Congress. It was quite an accomplishment for a superior Western
Pleasure horse! Frosty Zipper went on to breed mares here
at the farm and sired a Reserve World Champion, multiple
Superior offspring and numerous Futurity champions.
After his untimely death we were forced to make a decision
as to whether we wanted to shut down our breeding operation
or continue with it in a new direction, with a renewed committment.
We decided to continue and thus began the arduous search
for a new replacement stallion.
Over the next 45 days we had received many videos of young
stallions and several of these caught our attention. Within
no time, a trip was planned to the United Sates and we left
the kids to plan a hurried road trip across the Northern
States. We had seen most of the stallions within the first
4 or 5 days and by that time we were tired and wanted to
go home. We missed the kids and they missed us and so we
phoned to let them know we were coming back. When we talked
to Lindsay she wanted to know if we had found anything and
when we disappointedly said "no" her reply was "Did
you see the blue horse?" We said that because he was
in Texas we didn't have enough time to go down there and
back during this short trip and that we would probably go
in November during the World Championship Show. We had really
liked the video on "the blue horse" but Lindsay
was so taken by him that she insisted that we not come home
until we had seen him!
"The blue horse" was Three Dimension Zip. On the video that Tommy and
Dale Parker had sent us he was so black he looked blue and since we couldn't
always remember his name we simply referred to him as "the blue horse".
He caught our attention immediately but little did we know that Lindsay was awed
by him! Well, we turned the truck around and headed for Texas. The minute Tommy
pulled him out of the stall we knew this "blue horse" was the horse
for us.
In the showring "Buddy" was the kind of horse that
portrayed the demeanor one would associate with a gelding
who had campaigned for years! Since he had been bought as
a replacement stallion he was hauled to the shows and came
home to breed in between. Most horses would have had a problem
with this change in scenario but many times, he would go
from the breeding barn to the show pen all in the same afternoon,
rarely with a warm up and always with the same, quiet manner.
Due to the constraints of the breeding season, Buddy was
campaigned lightly for the next couple of seasons and yet
still managed to complete his Open Superior in Western Pleasure
and Trail. In 1998 he was retired from the show pen. He surprised
us by becoming the AQHA Open Hi-Point Trail Stallion as well
as securing a 10th place in the AQHA Open Hi-Point Junior
Trail. It seemed this was a fitting end to his career as
a show horse and a great beginning to his next role as head
stallion of the entire operation.
Buddy has somehow managed to exceed our greatest expectations
and has proven himself time and again, not only as an individual
but, more importantly, as a sire. From our years of experience
we have found that many stallions are great individuals,
however few are able to pass on those qualities that they,
themselves, possess. In this respect we found Three Dimension
Zip to be exceptional in his ability to repeatedly pass on
his own likeness.
We
would request that anyone interested in breeding
to Three Dimension Zip please phone the farm
at 403-347-6052 or email us at info@soderbergquarterhorses.com
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