Vale Mossy

August 16, 2021

First off, I hate writing posts like this because they make me really sad. I have a habit of becoming emotionally attached to the horses I work with. I’ve been criticised for this but in my defence getting emotionally involved with the horses I photograph means I to do a better, more thorough and complete job. The horses are the reason I get up in the dark at Stupid O’Clock and drive for 90 mins to photograph a horse at trackwork or the beach (or drive 1500km to a stud farm laden with equipment). It’s why I run back and forth from mounting yard to horse stalls on raceday, even when my feet, neck and shoulders are aching from carrying heavy equipment. Why I sit for hours researching bloodlines and race records, and why I get up early and stagger in the door after midnight when doing a day trip flying between Melbourne and Sydney, or Melbourne and Brisbane.

When I got an email from one of my favourite people in the industry telling me the stallion we all knew as ‘Mossy’, wasn’t doing so well it felt like more the links with the horses that paved my entry in to the industry were getting thinner. Mossman stood at one of my very favourite farms, Vinery Stud in the Hunter Valley. It is the farm I’ve worked for the longest and they unfailingly make me feel welcome. When I drive in their gates I feel like I’m coming home.

Mossy was 26, and when they get to this age you know that every day is a bonus. I know this only too well. My own Holsteiner mare Freelance is 28 years old this October. I know that every day with her is a good day and that the end could come any day now. For now she is bright and well and for her age looking remarkably well, notwithstanding the nasty colic attack she threw in just for kicks a few weeks ago. I guess she was making sure I was paying attention although on getting the vet bill I wish she hadn’t chosen to make such a statement on a Sunday evening!

Vinery announced Mossy was gone several days later. The first time I photographed Mossy was on the racetrack back in 1998. He was sired by SUCCESS EXPRESS and out of the mare LICHEN LADY. Success Express was a son of Hold Your Peace, who I don’t know much about, apart from the fact that he was a great grandson of Princequillo, the broodmare sire of the mighty Secretariat. Success Express also stood at Vinery and as well as Mossy he sired Al Akbar who is the broodmare sire of champion Winx.

On the track Mossy won the G1 JJ Atkins Stakes at 2 years old as well as the G2 AAMI Classic and the Listed Debonair Stakes at 3 years. He finished 2nd in the G1 AJC Sires and Australian Guineas and 3rd in the G1 Champagne Stakes and George Ryder Stakes, which is a testament to his versatility and determination. For good measure he also ran 4th in the G1 VRC Derby.

Mossy (Jimmy Cassidy) winning the G2 AAMI Vase on Cox Plate Day in 1998

At stud Mossy was a very successful stallion and although he didn’t enjoy the commercial ‘sex’ appeal some stallions, he was renowned for throwing good, fast and brave racehorses. He was a beautifully natured stallion, beloved by the entire team at Vinery Stud and enormously popular with visitors too. Mossy had been at stud for almost 10 years when I commenced doing some work for Vinery, so he wasn’t on the ‘official’ list of stallions I was asked to photograph all that often. Regardless I would always try to sneak some pictures of him whenever I could just because he was awesome. I would always plea for more time, and more shoots which may come across as me being self interested. The real reason I want to do this, however, is a driving ambition to capture as many high class photos as I can, both candid and structured, throughout a horse’s lifetime in order to properly illustrate their life and career and the relationships they form with the people who love them the most. I can’t help but feel a little bit ‘possessive’ of the horses I adore, it’s just who I am. I hope eventually it will lead to an enduring visual history of some of the horses I have been fortunate enough to work with.

JOSE and MOSSY. They loved each other.

Three precious head collars. Photographed at Vinery Stud in November 2019.

My friend Michelle with Mossy, after the 2018 Vinery Stallion Parade (also my 50th birthday!). We ducked back to see Mossy. Michelle was a part owner of “Celly” (Cellerman), one of Moss’s many stakes winners.

On the track Moss’s best runner was BUFFERING, a sprinter who won 6 Group 1 races in Australia, including the G1 Moir Stakes twice, the Winterbottom Stakes twice, as well as the Darley Sprint Classic and the Manikato Stakes - ‘The Buff’ LOVED racing at The Valley! Mossy was also the sire of a Golden Slipper winner, a feat many great stallions never achieve, siring MOSSFUN to win the 2014 Slipper, and was the sire of two winners of the G1 Coolmore Classic - OFCOURSEICAN and PLUCKY BELLE.