The Calgary ranch horse sale is a feel-good event that draws the cowboys to town.
It was added to the Calgary Bull Sale as a special attraction to bring in the crowds and refresh the event after 107 years. Organizers succeeded by filling the sales pavilion on the Stampede Grounds to the uppermost benches on March 7. The sale averaged $8,273 per head on 15 head.
The high seller came from Clinton Brost of Consul, Sask., who sold a nine-year-old gelding named Zan to Makayla Steinbach of Bassano, Alta., for $13,000.
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Brost also received a $10,000 silver and gold belt buckle for having the top seller with his registered Quarter horse, whose official name is Cash Em Feature.
“He’s an all round ranch horse that can team rope on Sunday,” he said after the sale.
Brost knew the horse was special when he bought it as a yearling in Alberta. He trained the horse and used it to work cows on the ranch.
Steinbach saw the horse earlier in the day at a demonstration in which the sale horses were put through their paces and said she knew immediately she wanted it to work on her family ranch and for team roping.
Her budget was $10,000, but during the bidding she stayed in contact with her mother by cell phone and listened to her boyfriend, Mitch, who kept asking if he should keep bidding.
“The bidding just kept going up and up,” she said.
She works on her family’s ranch and along with her three sisters keeps 100 purebred Red Angus. They also help their parents with a 150 head Simmental cross herd and the family owned oil company, Diamond Resources.
The second highest selling horse was from Charles Munro of Standard, Alta., who sold a grey gelding born in 2002 for $12,000.
