David and Pam Courtice are taking a deep breath, and as David says, putting their toes in the water with their new investment in the thoroughbred horse industry.
A few days ago they successfully ushered in the birth of their first foal of the season. “Prestige” was born to a fully imported warm blood Argentinus mare with David quick to identify a future show jumper.
“He’s straight, a fine face, plenty of bone and not too heavy”, says David with a smile on his face.
David and Pam’s stunning new 106 acre Tengarra horse stud has been taking shape for two years on Mountain View Road. Maleny. And local ‘sticky-beaking’ has been intense as mud has turned into green paddocks, and the impressive timber fencing defines the perimeter of this picture postcard property.
As David says with a laugh, “there’s been a lot of interest. We’ve had aeroplanes flying over and helicopters taking photos. It’s amazing”.
But David is quick to point out that there’s is not a flash property. “I’m a pretty average sort of guy. I don’t get around in suits and ties. That’s why I like Maleny. It’s pretty relaxed.”
“We looked all around Queensland for a property to do our show jumping. But in many places there’s no lifestyle. It might be good horse country but at the end of the day there’s no life. In Maleny you’ve got the best of both worlds . You’re in the hinterland and if you want to go down to the hustle and bustle of the Coast, it’s there”.
David and Pam are Bundaberg people, with David setting off to plant trees, run cattle and horses as soon as he left school as a 15 year old. By the time they were bought out two years ago by a large corporate organisation, David and Pat had assembled a number of rural properties.
“We were orchardists basically, avocado and mangoes,” says David, “and we used to run a lot of cattle all over the countryside”.
With five children and a strong interest in horses, David and Pat turned a personal corner and decided to set up a property for horse jumping. Their daughter Sam is the only professional show jumper in the family and it was another daughter Chrystal who found the Maleny property on the internet after David had been looking for 12 months.
“I knew as soon as I drove in that it was the right place but there was a lot of erosion”, says David. I brought a lot of machinery down with me from Bundaberg. We tidied up the erosion. Did the fencing ourselves. People wondered what we were doing here for a while because it was a bit of an eyesore. But we’ve gradually tidied it up.”
David is conscious of the bruising impact of the flu virus on the thoroughbred industry in recent times and so he’s moving cautiously into the breeding of race horses. Part of his attraction to Maleny was the development of Corbauld Park as one of the major race tracks in the state.
“We have 50 horses at the moment. We are spelling most of them for the thoroughbred industry. We have three of our own warm blood stallions here for stud, for outside mares to come in. The basics are spelling paddocks with a shelter shed. You can put million dollar horses in those pens. It’s safe. “
David’s daughter Sam is the driving force behind the showjumping aspect of the property. Apart from her own professional show jumping agenda, Sam teaches young children riding and show jumping. Spelled horses will also be trained and re-educated using their two 70 by 30 metre training rings.
The Courtices are optimistic about the future. People just keep bringing in horses says David. “We have 10 brood mares of our own. We breed 8-9 foals and we have 40 of our own horses here including three stallions.”
As for “Prestige”, the Maleny-born foal, for the next three years he will have the pleasure of simply galloping around the Maleny hills. He will then be broken in and trained for his first competition at four – a potential champion show jumper from Tengarra Park, Maleny.
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