by a group of dedicated women

Exercises in Registration

by a group of dedicated women

Registration guarantees a horse’s identity. Al Khamsa recognizes its importance in this and the next article.

The Problem

Ray Luebbe, (Nejed Arabians) former Arabian breeder of Chewelah, WA had a passion for Al Khamsa Arabian horses. His records indicate that Ray began assembling and breeding Arabians as far back as the 1980’s.

With pride, he focused on preserving straight desert bred Arabian bloodlines and building a breeding program of the rare Al Khamsa, Blue Star horses, with lines of *Turfa, *Fadl and *Nasr.

Over the years his work resulted in an impressive legacy of desert bred, Al Khamsa, Blue Star horses.

Kiana’s Story

In the summer of 2013, I was an advertising liaison for a gelding clinic being held by a local veterinary office. Ray contacted me hoping to sign up some of his stallions and asked for help in getting transportation to the clinic. I felt terrible that day to turn him away, I would have been happy to haul for him, but we couldn’t help him because the stallions didn’t meet safety criteria, as they weren’t halter broke.

In that first phone conversation Ray went on to say he was in his late 70’s, retired, and was concerned for the future of his horses. He had around 40 horses at that time and was worried that if something happened to him his horses would end up at slaughter. When I mentioned I was involved in horse rescue, he asked for help. My heart was instantly tugged, and that was the beginning of a threeyear endeavor to help Ray and his horses.

I began traveling from Spokane to Chewelah, about an hour and a half each way, on a regular basis in January 2014. Ray was doing his best to take care of his horses; that said, they were falling behind on socialization and training. Some aspects of care had begun to get harder for Ray.

In February 2014 I took my trailer and hauled out the first two foals to be rehomed. During subsequent trips I worked on helping get all of Ray’s horses caught, wormed, measured, groomed, and photographed for sales or rehoming ads that he or I would place later. He brought in trimmers to get hoof care up-to-date, and as the months went on, he and I both pitched in with that as well. When the need arose, we put together a round pen for some of the more challenging horses, so I could give further hands-on training, including seven who had to be trailer-trained, and some who had to be halter-broke.

Over the course of three years I was able to help Ray prepare nearly all of his 40 horses for placement in some way or another. Amazingly, there were three left when we last spoke before he moved out of state. I hauled out a total of seven horses for him and was directly responsible for rehoming six of the seven, including Comet [see the next section]. Nejed Penny Lane stayed with me permanently and Nejed Bindy came back to me before her owner moved away. I’ve continued to receive updates from many other owners of Ray’s horses through the years, and, like Comet, I’ve loved seeing how their lives have played out. Ray also took a lot of joy in getting updates of his horses after they left his farm.

Throughout my time with Ray he worked at registering a horse here or there on his own, but our last big push together was to collect DNA samples and fill out paperwork for 19 horses that had never been registered. We met in the upstairs banquet room at a Mexican restaurant in little town Chewelah, with laptops and piles of paperwork spread out on a large table. We worked through old photos to document each horse’s markings at birth, filled out each of the registration forms (2–3 pages per horse). A comedic end to a long day filling out paperwork was the surprise to learn Chewelah had no business who offered copy or print services at that time, lol… Ray had the brilliant idea to go to the tiny office of a local hotel and beg them for mercy, and let us pay for the use of their copier. We ended the day with copies of everything in case the originals got lost in the mail.

What makes this last push for registration so memorable more than the above mentioned, is most of these horses were over two years old, and at a larger cost per horse for registration fees. In some cases, he paid registrations for two generations in order to give lineage to the foals. Even in the ups and downs and hard work of it all, I’m so proud of Ray; in our final year working together, his eyesight had become an issue, working to bring in income harder, driving and doing paperwork challenging, but he didn’t give up; instead, he sold land and hired drivers to haul hay for his hay business in order to earn the nearly $5,000 it took to pay for the final registrations and protect his beloved horses’ legacy. He could have put that money into so many other areas very much needed for himself. These registrations, which he sacrificed for, contribute to the Blue Star programs, Al Khamsa, Inc., and the Arabian breed in general.

These three years involved a good bit of work for me, but for Ray it involved saying goodbye to his life’s work and the connection he had with his horses. He had so much invested in this breed. I’ll never forget my time with Ray, his horses, and was glad for the experience.

An update on my own two Nejed Arabians that came from Ray…

Although I never planned for them, Penny and Bindy have been a gift to have at our farm. Before the pandemic we ran a free Friday’s horse program where kids of all ages came out each week and learned hands-on equestrian ground training at no cost. Penny and Bindy both have had small kids as young as seven years old and up assigned to partner with in the program. The kids partnered with Penny and Bindy have proudly showed the girls during the fair and tromp about with here on our farm. In addition, Penny and Bindy are always pleased as punch to volunteer to be dressed up for holidays and the costume contest at fair. They have stayed gentle and patient with all.

Bindy is always the first at the gate, excited to spend time with her people. Penny is just as social but referred to as “miss fancy

Above: Nejed Penny Lane, 2013 mare, Nejed Aby x Nejed Aslan Gibi, below as Robin Hood’s trusty mount with Kiana’s son Josh. Opposite: Nejed Bindy, daughter of Em’s Comet. 2013 mare by Nejed Aby x Nejed Nijm Zarik.

pants”. She takes after her sire and stands out for naturally carrying herself with all the gentle prance and show of a princess. The girls are a big part of our family and we’ll always be grateful we’ve been able to share a life with them.

Em’s Story

Several years ago I was networking with a group which sought to obtain homes for horses in the kill pen of a local horse auction. I was already known as the 'Arabian lady' with my love of Arabians! At the time, Washington state was a gathering point for shipping horses to slaughter, with the horses going to Canada. Arabians were always at high risk of being sent to slaughter because people here wanted Quarter Horses and were afraid of Arabians. Historically, Washington has had a lot of Arabian breeders, and many of the smaller breeders were aging out and getting out of horses, putting their animals at risk. In particular, grey Arabians were at EXTREME risk for going not just to slaughter, but being sent to Mexico, because Canada would reject any horse with melanomas and the kill buyers didn't bother to even take the grey horses to the Canadian border, but shipped them straight to Mexico. This group took care of the local auction, but there were several other smaller auction houses which focused mainly on cows and other livestock, but which would occasionally run through horses, and no one was there to spot Arabians in need. There was,however, a small horse auction which took place in eastern Washington, but all of the people networking with me were in western Washington.

And then Kiana McLay joined the network. She lives in Spokane, very close to where this auction was held, and asked me if I would come over and show her what needed to be done to network for the horses in the eastern Washington horse auction. I went to Spokane, and the day of the auction, we discovered that the owners of the auction house had decided to no longer auction horses. But that was the beginning of my friendship with Kiana, which in turn resulted in her becoming interested in Arabians.

Somehow Kiana discovered that a breeder, Ray Luebbe, needed help with his Arabians. Not just any Arabians, Ray's horses were all Al Khamsa, and all Blue Stars as far as I know. When Kiana first started working with Ray, he apparently had around 50 horses on the property, [and things were beginning to get ahead of him]. Kiana managed to convince Ray to get all the unregistered foals DNAd and properly registered, resulting in saving around 15 or so breeding horses from losing their identity. [Age is not kind to any of us, and it required perseverence for Kiana to work through all of the issues]. Ray wanted to wait until there was a sale on registrations, since there were so many, and some of them were for horses that were by then more than two years old. But Kiana convinced Ray to get the DNA sent, the registrations applied for, and got those horses registered. [It is hard for any of us to let go of our horses, our babies, and this was also true for Ray. He hated seeing his horses go to new homes, as he knew all of the work he had put into creating that herd.]

Kiana was [nearing the end of what she could do], but she wanted one last thing—she had told Ray that she knew someone who absolutely loved Arabians, especially grey Arabians, and that this person would give Nejed Nijm Zarik a good home, where she would never be sold, and always loved. Ray just couldn't make up his mind about selling 'Comet', but Kiana didn't give up hoping.

Then one evening—July 5, 2016—Kiana sent me a message via Messenger:

Comet: Nejed Nijm Zarik 2003 Blue Star mare, Zairafan x Donallah Too.

"I'm on the phone with Ray right now. Ray is willing to give comet for free to you within the next week or so. I can transport, he will sign her over, and registration as well."

And just like that, Nejed Nijm Zarik was mine. Kiana went over and picked her up before Ray could change his mind, and kept Comet at her place for a month until I could make room for her.

I hoped I hadn't bitten off more than I could chew, though. Comet was barely halter broke, had had two foals at that point (sadly, one filly was never registered and I have been trying to track

her down without success), and had never been started under saddle. Comet was foaled in 2003, so she was already 13 years old at this point. I consulted with my trainer, who said she would be glad to get Comet started under saddle. Three years later, Comet still hadn't been started under saddle! I'd been doing a lot of ground work, but my trainer just kept putting it off and putting it off.

With amazing good luck, though, a young woman, Hannah Gramann, who had been taking lessons with my trainer had also been working with Comet. My trainer moved an hour away, and Hannah no longer had a horse to ride. She asked me if she could keep working with Comet, and I was thrilled that she wanted to help. Finally on April 15 of 2019, at 16 years old, when many horses are considered 'too old', Comet first had a rider sit on her! We are now working on getting Comet ready for mounted archery competitions. I would love to see Comet doing some endurance rides, but Hannah has a bad knee and wouldn't be able to do any rides further than 25 miles

This summer I watched the Tevis Cup, and discovered Virtual Tevis. I documented my adventures with Comet for our 100 miles of Virtual Tevis and had a great time watching her meet every challenge with aplomb. She is a fabulous mare, and I will always be grateful to Kiana that not only did I wind up with this great Al Khamsa mare, but even more, to Kiana for helping get all those Al Khamsa horses registered. Without her ceaseless urging, those horses and their bloodlines would have been lost forever. Hannah’s Story

I’ve only been consistently working with Comet for the past 2.5 years, and in that time we have both taught each other so much. She’s the first horse I’ve ever trained, and when I began working with her her only education outside of being halter broke was knowing how to be saddled and to carry a rider at the walk. It didn’t take her long at all to learn steering and leg cues. For the first year and a half we mostly only did some walk/trot in the round pen, occasionally doing some mechanical movements like shoulder and haunch turns. This past year has been where a lot of big breakthroughs have been happening. She can comfortably carry a rider and herself at the canter now, can do haunch/shoulder turns no problem, and she quickly picked up side-passing this spring. Every time I ride her she blows my mind at how soft and willing she is to go through our exercises as well as learn new things. She’s always paying attention to me and listening, even if we’re just relaxing in the middle of the round pen or arena doing nothing just in case I happen to ask for something. She never ceases to amaze me with how brave, patient, calm, and forgiving she is; the complete opposite of what the Arabian stereotype is. Anything I ask she tries her best to give, and she’s always open to allowing me to try something new, whether it’s new tack, a new discipline, a new exercise, or if we go check out a new location. She’s not really spooky, is always excited for a ride no matter the weather, and loves trying new things and mixing up our routine. ~ Hannah Gramann, trainer/rider of “Comet”

Em leading Comet with Hannah up.

Left above: Em leading Comet at the finish of the Virtual Tevis. Left below: Comet learning to jump.