Read the Success Stories for these former Bits & Bytes Farm horses.

 

The newest Success Stories have been moved to their own site: www.OTTBSuccessStories.com

 

* Horses with asterisk in front of their name were purchased as Prospect Horses directly from the track.

All photos on this Web site are copyright protected and may not be used without written permission of the photographer.

Shannon Darby bought Missilery as a Bits & Bytes Farm Prospect Horse

Shannon Darby bought Missilery as a Prospect Horse. She too was in communication with us when we received his photos from our contact at the track. We sent her the photos and she said she wanted to buy him.

 

 

 

Shannon and Missilery -June 27, 2005

Shannon and Missilery -June 27, 2005

 

 

 

 

Missilery got to look out the back of the trailer on the way home.

 

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Missilery

September 29, 2006

Hey Elizabeth!

I haven't checked my email in the longest time which is why I am just now responding to you. I am in Tallahassee, Florida visiting my sister right now so I can't send any pictures but, when I get home, I will.

Missilery is doing fabulous! We moved him this summer after being at the other barn for a year. We moved him out to Loganville at Kilkenny Farm.

I don't know if you know about Kilkenny, but it is the nicest farm I have ever been at. He stays in for about half the day and is turned out with a buddy. His weight has improved tremendously since we moved, also his feet look great too! The farrier here, Steve Schmidt, absolutely adores him!

We have done beginner novice so far. His dressage is great. We're training with Pam Schwartz/Kimble ( I can't remember what she goes by now!) once a week and he's really progressing with dressage because of the constant lessons.

We've been jumping with a few different trainers but nothing consistent so stadium/xc isn't as good as it could be :)

I think we're going to start training with Mary Bess Horton because she comes out once a week to Kilkenny for lessons.

I will dig up some pictures when we get home! He is so happy where he is now and hopefully we won't have to move him next year when I go off to college. I am thinking about either Auburn or UGA because I want to be a large animal vet! But I'll probably go to UGA so Orry will be able to stay right where he's at!

Shannon

August 31, 2005

Hey Elizabeth,
Missilery is doing great! We decided to name him Orry.. it suits him but I have no clue why! I love him so much.

He's putting on weight and is starting to get muscle and he is looking really handsome! The entire barn always says how sweet he is. . .. because that's the perfect way to describe him.

The horses in our pasture were kind of ganging up on him for a while, and even though he is still at the bottom of the herd, he has found a best friend in Future! (Editors Note: Backinthefuture was one of the first horses we brought home from the racetrack in 2001) We took Orry to Tribble Mill two weekends ago and he did awesome! He crossed little wooden bridges, creeks, went past people and even raced Cazzie across the dam. He was a perfect gentleman the entire time, even getting on/off the trailer!

My goodness I just can't say enough good things about him, I am loving every minute of it though! I will send some pictures.. we've been lazy and haven't taken any recent ones except for the ones we sent you a while ago.. oops! Anyways, we are hoping to go to a show in the fall.. probably just a walk-trot and maybe cross rails! It'll be so cute!

Shannon and Orry

July 7, 2005

Missilery is doing fabulous! I can't tell you how much I love
him! :)

Missilery and mom Shannon.

July 2, 2005

Hey!
We jumped our first "real" cross rail today!! He was awesome, it just made
me giggle because he had no clue what we were doing it for but did it
anyways! His canter on the left lead is really nice, but his canter on the
right lead is a bit more unbalanced :) but that's to be expected. I just
love him so much he's great! I will send pictures when I figure out how to
upload them onto the computer. Have a good 4th!
Shannon

Missilery and mom Shannon - June 30, 2005
Missilery and mom Shannon - June 30, 2005

June 27, 2005

I stayed out at the barn all day. Missilery is doing great. I walked him around this morning to stretch his legs and I let him out in a paddock. He's doing great. I just love him!

When we got back tonight we tacked him up and bridled him and lunged him in the round pen. He was awesome! He knew exactly what to do which totally surprised Jennie and me.

I don't have a single complaint or worry. He seems to be settling in a lot better than we expected. I got on him and walked him around the ring and he was perfect! Then we trotted. He has a very smooth comfortable trot and amazing movement. Jennie even got on him and loved him too! He was great! Thanks so much for finding him for me, we all love him and so does everybody else at our
barn!

Well thanks again. :)

- Shannon and Missilery

June 22, 2005 - Shannon's Trip to the Track to get Missilery

Elizabeth,
Sorry about the procrastinating of the story.. I've just been so busy with
Missilery, its 10:20 and I just got home! I'm having a blast and he is doing
great!

I was fortunate enough to experience the trip of a lifetime with my mom,
Elizabeth, and Barry: going up to the track!

We had the best time on the way up to Kentucky, where we stopped to look at a few horses at a private farm, and then continuing on to Ohio. I was so excited to finally see this horse that I had only seen pictures of.

After reading a fortune cookie that said "you will take a chance on something in the near future" we decided to take this leap of faith and not look back. We reached Ohio at about 10:30 and checked into our hotels and tried to get sleep for the short night. But none of us could sleep, and it seemed as though once we finally did go to sleep our alarm woke us up at 4:45 in the morning! Time to get up and go to the track, we had wanted to be there at 6:00.

We got to the track and immediately went to see Missilery. He was everything I had imagined and more, he nuzzled with us and wanted to be loved on constantly! It was love at first sight!

We eventually had to tear ourselves away from him to look at other horses for Elizabeth's prospects. We talked to trainers about horses, and even got to watch some of them work out on the track that we were standing right next to! It was the neatest thing ever!

We ate breakfast in the track cafeteria and then went right back out to taking pictures, talking to trainers, and watching the horses' movement. I had decided since the first time I saw Missilery that he was the one I definately wanted, so after the paperwork had been done we got the farrier to take his racing shoes off and we were ready to go.

After loading Missilery up at first, he became very nervous because there wasn't another horse on with him yet. So we had to take him off and put Snowdance Kid on first, who was just as calm as he was cute and sweet! Then Missilery went on at the back where they both had huge stalls since Elizabeth and Barry were able to open up space since there were only two on board! So off we went, we stopped a lot to eat, check the horses and get gas and both horses were amazing for the 11 hour trip!

The entire experience was one that I will never forget and I am very greatful to both Elizabeth and Barry for all of their help and expertise in helping me find Missilery! I love him so much and enjoy every minute I am around him.

Thanks so much again for all of ya'lls help, I will never forget what a great adventure this was for me!

Shannon

June 2005

Missilery was a Prospect Horse for sale in June. These were his photos.

Missilery was a Prospect Horse for sale in June.

 

Missilery was a Prospect Horse for sale in June.

 


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