Taits Producing Gems Before Dark Jewel Dynasty
18-11-2011
SIR CHARLES LEICESTER, an esteemed authority on breeding in England in the first sixty years of last century, in his historical book Bloodstock Breeding, described a stallion by the name of Willonyx, a winner of the Royal Ascot Gold Cup (4000m), as a very bad sire.
This did not stop the noted Australian pedigee buff R. C. Allen (Sydney’s Listed Reginald Allen Handicap) importing a daughter, Catania, and her becoming ancestress of gems from the paddocks of Gundagai district grazing Tait family before they gained fame through the Dark Jewel dynasty.
Bought for a modest price out of a Sydney racing stable, Dark Jewel was a handy non stakes performing filly by Star Kingdom who produced nine winners which were bred and raced by the Taits, including stakes stars Baguette, Heirloom, Betelgeuse, Cabochon and Birthright.
The second foal out of Dark Jewel, the Rego (Nasrullah sire) winner of nine races, including five stakes, Heirloom was foaled in1960, the same year that In Love, a Tait bred and raced descendant of Catania got at the Widden stud by the imported Tauber, won the Doomben10000 and finished second in the Doncaster.
Winner all told of 11 races and also runner up (to Noholme) in the1959 Epsom, In Love was a half-brother to Associate (11 wins up 3300m in Western Australia) and Stewardess, dam of Attentive (by Wilkes), in turn mother of Fiancee (by Baguette), brilliant fillies bred and raced by the Taits.
Attentive was a top 2-year-old who in the spring of 1963-64 followed a six lengths win in race record time in the Gimcrack at Randwick first up with success in the Silver Slipper, a second in the Reisling Slipper Trial, fourth in the AJC Sires’ and a Golden Slipper sixth. She won the Flight Stakes and Furious Stakes at three.
The Tait’s bred five winners using Fiancee, but sold the best of them, a Zephyr Zip filly, to Western Australia at the Sydney Easter yearling sale. Named Zip Me Up, she was a prominent Perth 2-year-old, winning the Queen’s Plate and finishing fourth in their Gimcrack Stakes.
Deceased at 17 in 2005, Zip Me Up had a rough trot as a broodmare, producing only six named foals from13 matings. One of them, the 2002 foaled Theophania, a Scenic mare who was third twice in six starts, has provided fresh excellence for the Catania family by producing So Swift, a 3-year-old gelding who was having only his fifth start when he followed up a 2.3 lengths maiden win at Hamilton, Victoria on October 31 with one over a strong field in the $350,000 Sandown Guineas on Saturday.
The father and son partnership of Bill and Symon Wilde of Warrnambool trained So Swift was outperforming his sire Barely a Moment, the runner up in the in the 2004 Sandown Guineas. It was, however, but one of eleven Group race cheques picked up by Barely a Moment in his 20 outings. Five Group1s in Melbourne were wins in the Sires’ Produce Stakes,Toorak Handicap and Invitation Stakes and seconds in the Caulfield Guineas and Salinger Stakes.
A grandson of Damascus in male line, Barely a Moment is by the shuttled American champion juvevile and leading sprinter Gilded Time and from the well related Danehill mare Lady Danna. He is one of the foundation sires at the Sam Hayes run Cornerstone stud on Lindsay Park at Angaston in South Australia.
So Swift was bred by a partnership in Victoria of Hall Thoroughbred Syndicate, Tim and Marijane Warren and sold as a weanling at sale in Melbourne for only $7,500 to Steve and Ceri’s Ampulla Lodge stud, Bunyip near Pakenham.
They took the colt to the Adelaide yearling sale and sold him privately to the Wildes for $40,000 after he was passed in, retaining a ten per cent interest. Also in the nine named owners is Warrnambool Racing Club Deputy Chairman Ashley King.
Courtesy of Brian Russell Bloodstock Media Services
