CLEVELAND BAYS
Cleveland Bays are a registered and long-established breed that has recently found itself in the spotlight due to it’s endangered status. All matings on the Estate are SPARKS approved to ensure as low an inbreeding coefficient as possible. This year (2023, the year of the X’s for the second time around!) our breeding programme has been delighted to welcome four new foals:
Cholderton Xenos (a colt by Kirksmore Wolfsbane x Cholderton Ulalia);
Cholderton Xena (a filly by Cholderton Icarus x Cholderton Icon)
Cholderton Xanthos (a colt by Cholderton Icarus x Cholderton Phsyche)
Cholderton Xana (a filly by Kirksmore Wolfsbane x Cholderton Theros)
For more information regarding our breeding programme on the Estate, including sending mares to stud, click here.
The breed was originally created in the north-east of England as a reliable mount and a tough all-rounder capable of pulling heavy loads. They were at their most popular in Victorian times, when they were often used as carriage horses because they were strong and ‘steady’, as well as uniform in colour.
A Cleveland Bay stud was founded on the Cholderton Estate by Henry Charles Stephens in the 1880s, and many Cleveland Bays were reared to work on the Estate, for sale in the UK and for export. The stud staff are pictured below at the stables, now a wedding venue (Kingsettle Stud).
Two Clevelands, Cholderton Rex and Cholderton Robert, were sold to the Royal Family in 1946, and they pulled carriages bearing members of the royal family and notable public figures on many state occasions (pictured above).
But by the 1970s Cleveland Bays had fallen completely out of fashion. Only four stallions were left in the world. Two of these were at Cholderton, and it is these stallions that kept the breed alive. At that time they had no economic value and it was only his affection for the breed that prompted Captain L Edmunds (Henry Edmunds’ father) to keep them on the Estate.
It was fortunate that he did, as today the Cleveland Bay is once again in the spotlight for those wishing to conserve our native rare breeds.
The Estate frequently has young and breeding stock for sale, most recently exporting specimens to the USA and Japan. Cholderton Bays can still be seen competing successfully on the showing circuit in the UK today, and working in the Royal Mews.
Horse ‘farming’ fits in well with Cholderton’s other agricultural regimes, where grass leys and re-seeded permanent grasslands form part of the overall land use strategy. As an added benefit, horses can be good for some wildlife; for example, their manure attracts insects that are preyed upon by the Estate’s healthy bat population.
For more information on Cleveland Bays from the Breed Society website click here