I’M very proud to have three champions in our yard at the same time,” quips Shirley Hurst as we take a stroll through Tattygare Stud, right on the edge of the village of Lisbellaw in Co Fermanagh.
And rightly so, she should be very proud. Standing in adjacent stables is their own home-bred Tattygare Me Me Me, supreme ridden hunter at the RDS last August; Sharon Kelly-Murphy’s reigning All-Ireland three-year-old champion Annaghmore Dunkirk, and his half-brother Annaghmore Flo Pleasure, the All-Ireland two-year-old champion of 2024.
As Adrian Hurst’s home place, these same stables have been the home to champions for well over 40 years.
A glance at the walls of their home is a reminder of these wins, and their many other achievements over the past four decades. Dozens of framed images of winners at shows the length and breadth of Ireland, with countless trophies and sashes to back them up.
Modest, and not ones to blow their own trumpet, they instead let the horses do the talking and rarely leave a show empty-handed.
The Dublin Horse Show, in particular, has given them some great days out, but none so emotional as that in August of last year when their home-bred Tattygare Me Me Me made history when picking up the hunter mare, four-year-old, lightweight and ultimately the supreme hunter championships in the Main Arena. She was superbly ridden on the day by Jamie Smyth and Gwen Scott, who took the ride for the lightweight judging.
Adrian and Shirley Hurst, and their daughter Adrianna, with their supreme hunter champion Tattygare Me Me Me, ridden by Jamie Smyth at the 2024 Dublin Horse Show \ Siobhan English Photography
Fitting crown
“To breed a champion like that is something really special,” Shirley commented. “We had waited years for it.” They had won almost every other accolade in the young horse and mare rings prior, and some hunter weight titles too, but this supreme hunter crown was the one that had always got away.
It was fitting that a home-bred would finally clinch it, given their dedication to sport horse breeding for so long.
By the recently deceased sire Arkan (by Arko III), Tattygare Me Me Me has an equally tremendous performance pedigree through her dam LCC Yoko (Iroko), who has also produced the three-star event horse Leamore After Hours (one of nine by Arkan) and comes from the same family as the 1.60m jumper Big Ed.
LCC Yoko is now in foal to Caspar 232 and due in the coming months.
Champion filly and reserve champion two-year-old at Balmoral and reserve champion filly at the RDS in 2022, Tattygare Me Me Me was also a winner of the HSI loose jumping at Kernan’s in November 2023. She won two 1.10m competitions already this season with Lisa Doogan and is now qualified for the Star of the Future Performance Championship at Balmoral under Gwen Scott.
Equine physiotherapist Sharon Kelly-Murphy has been a family friend for many years and last year the Hurst team achieved a rare double for the owner when Annaghmore Dunkirk (HHS Cornet) won the All-Ireland at Bannow and Rathangan and his half-brother Annaghmore Flo Pleasure (Kinmar Hero Z) won the All-Ireland at Tinahely, in addition to the inaugural Northern Ireland Youngstock Championship for two-year-olds.
Annaghmore Dunkirk had also been in the ribbons on several occasions as a two-year-old, including reserve champion in his age group at Dublin, and went on to be reserve young horse champion there the following year. He is now broken and riding and will be lightly campaigned under saddle in 2025.
Both were bred by Aoife Healion and are out of the Clover Echo mare HHS Flo Echo. They are from the same direct family as Marion Hughes’ great Flo Jo, as well as HHS Cashmere and HHS Catwalk.
Jamie Smyth taking a lap of honour on Tattygare Me Me Me after the four-year-old mare was crowned supreme hunter champion in the Main Arena at the 2024 Dublin Horse Show \ Siobhan English Photography
Success story
The success story for Shirley and Adrian Hurst started back in 1996 when they first met – appropriately at the Dublin Horse Show – although they had both been involved in horses since childhood.
Shirley started off in ponies near her hometown of Strokestown, Co Roscommon. “I later travelled to South Africa for a few years and came home in my early 20s. My first supreme young horse win at Dublin came with a horse called Mr K, for my mother Harriet.
“He had also won an All-Ireland title at Ballinasloe as a yearling the year previously, after which she bought him. He won Dublin again as a three-year-old after being bought by Willie McDonnell. He later went eventing to Germany.”
Adrian’s earliest memory of Dublin is from the 1980s when Golden Cameo was being shown by his late father JJ. Not surprisingly the love of horses was passed down a generation, and again to Shirley and Adrian’s daughter Adrianna (22), who is very much part of the team. They also have two sons, James (21) and William (16).
They all rode as children and Adrianna showed Tattygare Me Me to place reserve in the Pembroke Cup last year.
Shirley’s late father Austin Cox is credited with breeding Golden Sunset (by Well Read), winner of the first ever Breeders’ Championship at the RDS in 1985 for Paddy Quirke. The mare also won it again in 1987, but the Hurst family themselves went on to win five Breeders’ titles between 1995 and 2004.
The first of those in 1995 was won by Adrian’s father JJ with My Irish Bride VII, a daughter of Chou Chin Chow who traced back to some great Irish Draught mares including Pink Carnation, winner of the inaugural Greenvale National Broodmare Championship in 1977.
My Irish Bride VII won the Breeders’ again in 1997 with another colt by Euphemism, and in total won six times at Dublin (the Coote Cup on three occasions), the last when she was 17 years old.
Another home-bred, My Golden Bonnie, was a Breeders’ champion in 1999 and winner of the Coote Cup in 2000. She was out of that Cidrax mare Golden Cameo who produced 10 foals in total (four of which were fillies and were retained), many of them being by the thoroughbred Euphemism.
JJ Hurst was a great supporter of that French thoroughbred Cidrax who in the 1990s sired numerous winners on the track and also sired the Grade A show jumper and multiple Grand Prix winner The Music Man (Harry Marshall).
Golden memories
Also among those by Euphemism was Tattygare Golden Moments, winner of the Breeders’ for Shirley and Adrian in 2004, and Tattygare Golden Delight, who won the stinted mares’ class as a three-year-old and went on to be one of their most prolific broodmares.
Their half-sibling, Tattygare My Fair Lady (by Star Kingdom), was champion three-year-old, champion filly and winner of the Pembroke Cup in 2003. Also in the winners’ enclosure that year was the thoroughbred filly Very Smart who was owned in conjunction with Shirley’s mother.
In 2006 Tattygare My Fair Lady took the Limerick Matron title while carrying a foal to Flaming Feather. “We were actually attending the wedding of our good friend Tiernan Gill the day before,” commented Shirley. “We brought the mare with us to Mayo and drove to Limerick the next morning where she won!”
Tattygare Golden Moments is also a former winner of the Limerick Lady.
Young Horse Champion, Hurst Show Team's Tattygare Good To Go, shown by Shirley Hurst, also won the mare, three-year-old Championship and Pembroke Cup at Dublin in 2013 \ mdpix.ie
In 2005 the Hursts won the thoroughbred class again with the two-year-old filly Tattygare In The Pink. “We had some good success in that thoroughbred young horse class when it ran for yearlings, two and three-year-olds. It is a pity it no longer takes place,” Shirley said.
Interestingly, the full-sisters My Golden Bonnie, Tattygare Golden Moments and Tattygare Golden Delight all competed in the same ring for the Coote Cup one year.
Hurst Show Horses had actually won their first Breeders’ title in 2002 with the home-bred Tattygare April Dawn (by Ireland’s Pride) and her colt foal by Limmerick. They also claimed second with Tattygare Golden Delight and a filly by Porsch.
Tattygare April Dawn went on to produce a few more by Limmerick, including Flogas River Moy, champion yearling and winner of the Laidlaw at Dublin for Tiernan Gill in 2007.
Tattygare Golden Delight produced 12 foals. The most successful of those, without doubt, was Tattygare Good To Go. “She was incredibly lucky for us and won everything as a young horse,” commented Shirley Hurst.
A striking daughter of the Belgian Warmblood stallion Porsch, the bay won the All-Ireland two-year-old in Kildysart and also the three-year-old equivalent in Bantry, and an All-Ireland in Castlewellan.
She was reserve champion two-year-old at Dublin in 2012 but had a clean sweep 12 months later when champion three-year-old, champion filly and winner of both the Pembroke for champion home-bred and also the Laidlaw for champion young horse.
The same year she was champion filly and reserve champion young horse at Balmoral.
In 2014 she was in the Main Arena to claim champion mare with Rosemary Connors riding, and in 2015, with Jamie Smyth in the saddle, was champion mare and champion middleweight. She has since produced four colts and all have been sold on.
Tattygare Golden Delight produced several others by Porsch, including Tattygare Watch Me, winner of the yearling, filly and Pembroke titles as a yearling. The late Robert Oliver bought her after Dublin the following year.
Tattygare Something Special, a gelding also by Porsch, was winner of the All-Ireland yearling championship at Carnew in 2014 and a winner at Balmoral under saddle as a four-year-old. Another was Tattygare Mr Perfect, who was reserve champion yearling at Dublin, and Tattygare Watch This Space, a winner as a yearling and two-year-old at Dublin, and an All-Ireland yearling champion. Later sold, he went on to be champion riding horse at the Horse of the Year Show in 2013 for owner Pearl Underwood.
Tattygare My Fair Lady was a multiple winner at the RDS, including champion three-year-old, champion filly and recipient of the Pembroke Cup in 2003
Another offspring is Tattygare Last Delight (by Arkan) who was bought unseen from the Hursts as a four-year-old. The eight-year-old is eventing and competing in pure dressage in the UK with Jodie Coombes.
Household name
Following the successes of their home-breds as they move on is very important to Shirley and Adrian, and the Tattygare prefix is very much a household name in horse circles.
Another home-bred winner across the water was the Porsch gelding X Factor, a Cuddy finalist in the UK for Moggy Hennessy in 2007.
In addition to those owned by Kelly-Murphy, Shirley and Adrian have often shown horses for other prominent producers and owners, including Dessie Gibson, James McWeeney, Jimmy Quinn and Murphy Stud.
In 2012 Shirley also showed the two-year-old gelding Northern Image to win the Laidlaw Cup for John Donaghy.
Looking ahead to this summer and it’s already firing up to be a busy one at Hurst Show Horses. Not only are they already kept on their toes with their suckler herd and some 100 breeding ewes on their out-farms, but they are also now preparing for foaling season and some of the youngstock for the showing circuit.
Among their current band of mares is Kilbracken Cornet Queen (Orestus). Her dam, Cornetta 10, jumped to 1.40m internationally with Jennifer Kuehnle.
The Hursts also recently acquired Ramiro In The Air, dam of the 2024 Kilguilkey two-star winner Manjushri. Thomas Quigley already owns two of her progeny, a two-year-old by Balou Du Rouet and a yearling by Echonix.
Just as one horse moves onto the next stage of their career, the Hursts have others coming through, with the three-year-old gelding Tattygare All Eyes On Me (Arkan) and the three-year-old Tattygare Extra Edition (Corporal VDL) expected to make their showing debuts this summer.
They also have a two-year-old by A. Umonia 60 named Tattygare I Prefer Cash, who was bought as a foal from his breeder Thomas Duffy.
“We also enjoyed a good season last year with My Valleys Diamond (by Vittorio) for owner/breeder William Little. She won nine out of her 11 outings in the yearling rings and will hopefully be out again soon.”
Shirley Hurst admits they love the country shows, particularly those in the midlands, but their aim is always the big championships where horses, if they do well, will often find a new owner.
As the saying goes, ‘it takes a village’, and Shirley credits the backroom team of Ruth, Kelly and Paula, for helping to keep the show on the road. “We are always grateful for all their hard work.
“It’s a long season which begins in Balmoral next month,” she concluded.