CE Mount Eros

Mount Eros, known at home as Monty, is by Morricone I out of our homebred mare CE Da Vinci’s Aphrodite (Bonnie). Combining the influential Millennium–Morricone bloodline with generations of our own breeding, Monty holds a particularly special place within our programme as the only foal Bonnie produced before we lost her unexpectedly.

His sire, Morricone I, is by Millennium out of the Rubin-Royal mare Hartima. Morricone was named Champion Stallion at the 2014 Oldenburg Licensing and went on to establish himself as both a successful performance horse and an influential breeding stallion, progressing through to Grand Prix while producing numerous licensed sons and successful dressage offspring.

Morricone’s sire, Millennium, has become one of the most influential stallions in modern European dressage breeding, particularly through the large number of successful stallion sons he has produced. The maternal side of Morricone’s pedigree adds the influence of Rubin-Royal, himself a Grand Prix performer and highly regarded dressage sire. Together, these lines give Monty considerable depth of proven dressage performance and breeding success on his sire’s side.

The strength of this family can also be seen through Morricone I’s full siblings, including Morricone III, who is currently being campaigned successfully by British international dressage rider Gareth Hughes. This makes the family particularly interesting to us, combining horses that have proven themselves in breeding with those demonstrating their ability in sport.

Monty’s dam, Bonnie, was by our own CE Sir Fidermeyer out of CE Ekurante. She was a very clever and personable mare with plenty of energy, a particularly quick hindleg and qualities we were incredibly excited to develop both under saddle and through breeding. We backed and rode Bonnie away ourselves before bringing her into our breeding programme.

Through CE Sir Fidermeyer, Monty carries Sir Fidergold, Sarkozy, Fidermark and Weltmeyer. Sir Fidergold was by Sarkozy out of a Fidermark mare, while CE Sir Fidermeyer’s dam brought the influence of Weltmeyer, giving Bonnie a strong foundation of established German dressage breeding.

Bonnie’s dam, CE Ekurante, brings a different dimension through her Dutch and Belgian breeding. Ekurante is by Warkant van ’t Gestelhof, a son of Ferro, and out of a Jazz mare. This brings two particularly influential Dutch dressage lines into Monty’s maternal pedigree. Ferro competed internationally at Grand Prix and became one of the foundation sires of modern Dutch dressage breeding, while Jazz also competed at Grand Prix before establishing an exceptional legacy as a sire.

The combination means Monty carries Morricone, Millennium and Rubin-Royal through his sire alongside Sir Fidergold, Sarkozy, Fidermark, Weltmeyer, Ferro and Jazz through Bonnie. It gives him an interesting mixture of modern German breeding with established Dutch performance blood, underpinned by several generations of horses that have influenced international dressage.

For us, however, Monty’s importance goes considerably beyond the names within his pedigree. Bonnie produced Monty before we lost her unexpectedly, making him her only foal and the only direct continuation of her line. We had hoped to produce further offspring from Bonnie, so losing her made retaining this part of our breeding programme particularly important.

Monty therefore carries a maternal line that we otherwise would have lost with Bonnie. Having bred his dam ourselves, backed and ridden her away and known her character so well, it makes watching Monty develop particularly meaningful to us.

As Bonnie’s only offspring, Monty will always be a very special horse within our programme. We are incredibly excited to give him the time to develop and ultimately see whether the intelligence, energy and quick hindleg we valued so highly in his dam, combined with the proven performance blood of Morricone I, can carry forward into his own ridden career.