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Clydesdales make Beef Empire Days debut
Published 6/12/2009 in Beef Empire Days-Entertainment
By MONICA SPRINGER
Those who gather at the Beef Empire Days PRCA Rodeo this weekend will see the Budweiser Clydesdales with their manes and tails braided with ribbon, their brass and silver harnesses polished and shined to perfection.
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Laurie Sisk/Telegram — The Budweiser Clydesdales make their way around the arena Thursday night at the Finney County Fairgrounds during the Beef Empire Days PRCA Rodeo.
Behind the ribbons and shine of the horses, there are hours of work involved for the six-person team that cares for the animals on the road.
The Clydesdales will make an appearance at the rodeo at the Finney County Fairgrounds this weekend. The rodeo starts at 7:05 p.m. today and Saturday. The horses will be available for public viewing from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. each day through Sunday at the Horse Barn at the fairgrounds.
When the horses make an appearance at a rodeo, the day starts at about 7 a.m. for six handlers. The Clydesdales are fed, then taken on a 30-minute walk or let loose to run in a rodeo arena, said Pete Petersen, supervisor of the team that cares for the horses.
Then, for the next six hours, the horses are groomed and their harnesses polished. Each harness weighs 130 pounds and is made specifically for the horse that will wear it. It takes about five hours for the handlers to polish the silver and brass, Petersen said.
On Thursday afternoon, the Clydesdales took turns getting bathed and combed before their appearance at the rodeo. When the handlers led them back to their pens, onlookers watched as the horses walked, their giant footsteps echoing on the concrete.
The Clydesdales at the fairgrounds range in age from 5 to 13 and weigh between 1,800 and 2,200 pounds. They stand a foot taller than a regular horse and weigh about two times more, Petersen said.
Clydesdales were brought to North America in 1842 and were used for delivery transportation, until they were replaced with vehicles.
In 1933, to celebrate the end of prohibition, August A. Busch Jr., presented his father with a team of Budweiser Clydesdales and a bright red brewery wagon. The hitch carried the first case of post-prohibition beer from the St. Louis brewery.
"They're magnificent animals," said Linda Mohn, who just moved to Garden City a week ago from Missouri. Mohn brought her two grandchildren, Breanna and Tony Akery, out to see the horses on Thursday afternoon.
"They're pretty tall," Tony said.
His sister added: "I really like them."
They viewed each horse and read a pamphlet of facts in front of their stalls.
The horses are bay in color, have a blaze of white on the face, black mane and tail and white feathering on all four legs and feet.
There are five traveling Clydesdale teams that travel more than 100,000 miles a year. They travel in a caravan of three custom-built semitrailers, with rubber flooring, air suspension and vent fans. The first two semitrailers carry the horses and a third carries the equipment and brewery wagon. There are cameras in the semis and monitors in the cabs that allow drivers to keep an eye on their cargo.
The public views the horses in red stalls, and the front of the stalls are decorated with flowers.
A dalmation, King, stays in the middle stall with toys, with four horses on either side of him. The two spare horses are kept in stalls behind the eight horses used for the rodeo.
There are 10 horses that travel together, with eight being used for performances and two being used as back-up horses. The horses each have their own stalls with their names sewn in fabric above each stall: Jake, Marshall, Yankee, Chuck, McGee, Lee, Chad and Carter.
Once the horses and their handlers leave on Sunday night, they will head to Davenport, Iowa, Petersen said.
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