A new era for Blue Gum Farm ahead of Premier

Cover image courtesy of Blue Gum Farm

It’s been 41 years since Blue Gum Farm set up sticks in Euroa, time enough to become one of the consistently brilliant vendors on the Victorian yearling circuit.

However, things are a little different for the operation this week at the 2023 Inglis Premier Yearling Sale. It will be the first time ever that the Blue Gum draft will be offered on behalf of the farm’s new owners, Trilogy Rural Investments.

In September last year, news broke that Blue Gum Farm had been sold to Trilogy, a partnership between Jason and Mel Stenning and Sean and Cathy Dingwall, and in November the settlement was final. It meant that one of Victoria’s most successful and long-running family operations had been finally sold.

This week at Oaklands Junction, nevertheless, Blue Gum Farm is there among the 66 vendors catalogued. It has 30 horses to sell and they belong to the farm’s long and loyal clients, including the likes of Robert Crabtree’s Dorrington Farm.

There was little doubt last year that Blue Gum would continue to be a force in Victorian breeding outside of the ownership of Philip and Patti Campbell, and Sean Dingwall, speaking to TDN AusNZ this week, said he was very proud to be selling under the Blue Gum name for the very first time.

“The majority of these are client horses that have been on the farm for a very long period, and we’ve maintained those relationships,” Dingwall said. “It’s a very, very good draft of yearlings and we’ve had significant feedback from our parade days last week.

“Many of the families in this draft have been with Blue Gum for a long time and there are a lot of siblings that have graced the racetrack and been successful, horses like Crosswinds, Bruckner and so on.”

Trilogy is hoping for more of the same when it comes to this week’s Melbourne sale. For example, at Flemington this Saturday, five of the horses nominated for the 1200-metre Inglis Sprint are graduates of this sale’s 2021 Blue Gum draft.

In its history under the Campbell family, the farm sold Victoria’s first $100,000-plus yearling (in 1981), and in 2016 it set a Victorian vendor record by gross at this sale. It’s been the leading consignor on multiple occasions, not to mention its eight individual yearlings that have topped the Premier Sale in one category or another in the last handful of years.

“The pedigrees from Blue Gum drafts have really stood up over time, and I think there are a number of standout individuals in this one that will do the same,” Dingwall said.

The transition for Trilogy into Blue Gum Farm has been seamless the last six months. The new owners have retained the property’s valuable staff, which Dingwall said was a high priority.

“By being able to keep the staff and keep the whole business ‘as usual’, it kept things very simple,” he said. “Staff are the most important part of any business, and right now we’re not looking to change that much on the farm.

“We’re going to bed ourselves in for the next 12 months and then look at what we might do going forward, but we do have a desire to stand stallions again and that will probably be the priority.”

The Campbell touch

Sean and Cathy Dingwall had a stout record before Blue Gum Farm as the studmasters of Caithness Stud, so they need little assistance this week with presenting their 30-strong draft.

Nevertheless, it’s a show of goodwill that they’ve brought back Philip Campbell to assist them at Oaklands Junction and, after a family history in thoroughbred breeding that goes back to 1963, Campbell is right at home.

“I'm here at the sale assisting the farm with the draft and assisting the staff, but I am definitely not in control,” he said with typically good cheer. “I’ve had 42 or 43 years of experience putting drafts through Premier, so I’m only too happy to help out this week.”

As far as experience goes, Campbell and Blue Gum haven’t missed a Premier Sale in decades. Even the land at Oaklands Junction is stamped by the Campbell family, with Graham Campbell, Phil’s father, overseeing its purchase in 1980 by Dalgety Bloodstock.

The horses in the Blue Gum draft this week were all raised on the farm during Campbell’s tenure and he knows each of them. But part of his exit last year was encouraging clients to remain under Trilogy’s ownership, which has largely happened.

“We are very excited that our clients stuck with the farm because all of the staff that worked with Patti and I are still there, working with the new owners,” Campbell said. “Really, the only thing that changed is that Patti and I are no longer in control.

“The staff and the clients are still there and that’s a wonderful legacy to leave, and it's something we’re very proud of. It’s a strong reason why I’m very happy to be here this week assisting with Premier.”

Campbell has spent his time well since moving on from Blue Gum Farm. Over 40 years in a gifting but exhausting profession, with its early mornings, long days and late nights, took its toll, and you’d forgive him for not quite knowing what to do all of a sudden last November.

“We took a big deep breath and a step back, and we’re enjoying some quieter time,” he said. “We’ve done a little bit of travelling overseas and we’re not really sure where we’ll end up or what that looks like yet.

“I’m sure it will all become clearer as time goes by but January and February this year certainly came with some interesting feelings.”

This week, at least, Campbell will get his ‘yearling fix’ and sale-goers will get a familiar face when they visit the Blue Gum draft in Barn A. Each of the 30 yearlings are catalogued for the Premier session, and they represent 25 individual sires from both Victoria and New South Wales.

“We were responsible for putting this draft together last year,” Campbell said. “It’s probably the last one I’ll ever put together at Blue Gum so I’m really interested to see how it goes.”

The Dorrington connection

One of the premier vendors within the Blue Gum draft is Robert Crabtree’s Dorrington Farm, which already has form on the board.

Two years ago, Lot 70, a colt by Written Tycoon, was part of a Blue Gum draft and he topped the 2021 Inglis Premier Yearling Sale when selling to James Harron Bloodstock for $1.1 million. It made Blue Gum the first vendor to ever tip over a $5 million aggregate at a Victorian sale.

Lot 70 was bred by Crabtree and consigned by Blue Gum on his behalf, and the colt turned out to be the stakes-winning Crosswinds (Written Tycoon) from Crabtree’s Gimcrack-winning filly Gybe (Fastnet Rock). A Crosswinds full sister will be offered this week as Lot 458, one of five that Dorrington has embedded in the Blue Gum draft.

“We’re pleased with the horses that we’ll offer this week,” Crabtree said. “It’s what we try to do. Our maison d’aitre is that we’re building families, and sometimes we have one, two and three generations on a page that we’ve bred or raised.

“The advantage of that is two-fold. First of all, we know that bloodlines work, otherwise we wouldn’t be pursuing them. Secondly, it’s great to see the progress of your horses with outside trainers, or with us if we stay in them.”

Dorrington’s four other horses this week are Lot 394 by Dundeel (NZ), Lot 557 by Written Tycoon, Lot 602 by Trapeze Artist and Lot 613 by So You Think (NZ).

Lot 394 is a half-sister to the Kiwi Filly of the Year Imelda Mary (NZ) from the closely related family of Fashions Afield (Redoute’s Choice), while Lot 557 is a half-brother to the Group-placed filly Charity Spirit (Cable Bay {Ire}).

Lot 602 is from the G3 Toy Show H. winner My Sabeel (NZ) (Savabeel), and Lot 613 has international flair. She’s from the French Listed winner Not Only Florina (Ire) (Makfi {GB}) whose first foal, Sisterhood (American Pharoah {USA}), was second on debut a fortnight ago for the Maher-Eustace operation.

Gallery: Dorrington Farm's yearlings to be offered through the Blue Gum Farm draft at the Inglis Premier Yearling Sale, images courtesy of Inglis

So far this year, Crabtree has sold 100 per cent of his horses on the yearling-sale circuit. He has had a 100 per cent strike rate at the Premier Sale alone for the last three years, and that's something he's hoping to keep intact later this week.

“Premier is our home sale and it’s a place where it’s important to have quality instead of numbers,” Crabtree said. “Any of us can put a horse in this sale because Inglis look after us in Victoria, but I think you should only be selling horses that you honestly believe in.

“We’re not always right, but Dorrington Farm has a very high 80s, nearly 90 per cent winners to runners off the farm. I think that’s terribly important, but also it’s terribly important to make sure you sell them all because that’s the integrity of your breeding.”

For Crabtree, selling all of his horses in a particular draft is critical.

“It takes a little courage to take unders on a horse, hoping that you’ve then got overs to come,” he said. “It can depend on the order of things too. Sometimes you sell a big one early and that can carry you through, but it’s a matter of integrity.

“If we undersell, hopefully that horse will go to a good home and still bring rewards through the mare, which comes back to that point of building families.”

Crabtree has good intentions to continue his association with the Blue Gum brand. For the last few years at Premier, he has consigned his yearlings to Campbell and now, this year, to Trilogy.

“It’s refreshing to see new players come into the industry and Trilogy is a big player,” he said. “They’ve involved a lot of good partners like Newgate and China Horse Club, for example, and I would imagine I’ll remain involved with Blue Gum Farm. That’s certainly what we’re all working towards.”