Diamond Creek Farm held its third annual Open House on June 3 at its Wellsville, Pennsylvania location.
“The Open House is a way for us to welcome the community and all the fans to our farm,” said Diamond Creek’s Adam Bowden. “Many people never get a chance to see what happens behind the scenes at a breeding farm, or they are curious about what goes on here when they see all the fences and barns from the road.”
The day was a huge success with well over 400 attendees largely from the community and with some visitors as far as North Carolina.
Visitors were able to get up close and personal to stallions such as Southwind Frank as well as watch two different breeding demonstrations, in which Always B Miki and Sweet Lou were artificially collected. They were then welcomed into the lab as the farm’s resident vet, Dr. Courtney Pink, processed the semen and answered questions from the group.
Down in the mare barn, visitors were welcome to walk around on their own or take a hayride tour around the farm. They had a chance to submit names for a new foal as well as pet a few and feed some carrots to some very willing mares. The “guess the weight” game proved to be popular, with guesses to win a t-shirt ranging from 100 pounds to 700. In the end, the colt weighed 500 pounds on the dot.
Guests also got to meet Sweet Karen, the Harness Horse Youth Foundation’s spoke horse, and learn more about the program from director Ellen Taylor and her group of volunteers as well as spin their wheel to answer some harness-related questions for some of the new 2017 HHYF Harness Hero cards.
Pacing For The Cure, represented by the founders, Jeff and Janine Gesek, were present as well, speaking about their work for MS research and raffling off some really great baskets as well as a trip to the 2017 Hambletonian.
With great weather, the farm served close to 600 hamburgers and hotdogs and Bootleg Creamery gave out over 400 bowls of ice cream.
“We look forward to doing this event every year,” said Rachel Keeney, Diamond Creek’s Administrator Director. “We are already planning on how to make it bigger and better in 2018.”
(With files from Diamond Creek)