HOW IT ALL BEGAN
Jamuna Performance Horses is the culmination of over fifty years of the founder of the stud, Donna Sadler, being involved in the equine industry. Donna has been breeding performance bred Quarter Horses for over twenty five years but had been involved with breeding and training top level Arabians and other show horses for twenty years prior to that, so she comes from a background heavily involved with the breeding side of equine athletes and show horses.
Donna has been riding and competing for over fifty years - she started in pony club, moved up through the ranks and evented and showjumped at State Championship level, and showed English show horses in hand and under saddle to many Royal championship. Her attention then turned to breeding and she began one of the largest and most successful Arabian studs and training centres in Australia – Wildon Park, culminating with many Australian, national and international championships, the importation from the States of the first two Ruminaja Ali get in the country and multiple exports across the world. Her passion is to study and research bloodlines and the challenge to produce the very best animal she can- which is evident in the success her home bred show and performance horses and group winning greyhounds have enjoyed, both here and overseas.
In 1991 she moved to her new property Jamuna in Nar Nar Goon, Victoria and Jamuna Arabians was born. This is where the JA comes from in the stud’s prefix and brand – it’s a brand seen on many champions of many different breeds and disciplines.
Whilst still focusing on Arabians, Thoroughbreds, (a Sir Tristram son) Warmbloods and Riding pony stallions were also added to the program and at its height Jamuna was breeding around ninety mares a year and producing around twenty of its own foals. Most of this breeding was done by live cover. Very different to what we deal with today.
Around 1996, a chance meeting with a very old friend led to Donna having a ride on “one of those western horses” and she was bitten by the bug and she grew to admire and appreciate a good Quarter Horse. She gravitated towards the reining because of its intricacies, difficulty and the high level of training a top reiner required to be successful. In 1998, she ran her first reining pattern on a feisty Doc Denius/Freckles Jay Jay mare and in 2000 she won her first NRHA National Championship on her beloved Cuttarbars Colonel stud Just Foolin. The thought and research that was put into breeding the Arabians was employed in the search for breeding stock for a reining horse program and several top mares and the young Lethal Lena son, Low N Lethal, joined Jamuna. Both stallions became multi national and NRHA champions with Donna training and riding them and they went on to produce some outstanding horses. Utilizing the mares that were carefully chosen over the years, including importing the only direct Gunner daughter ever brought to Australia,and searching out the right stallions for these mares, from here and the US, Jamuna produced futurity and derby winners and many successful horses in other area including the NCHA Hall of Famer JA Lethal Style.
During these years, Donna was lucky enough to begin cutting and had a great season culminating with a Rookie buckle after winning a Hi point at Lone tree Hill on the great old horse Paraweena Gunsmoke. The difficulty of consistently being able to have cattle to work on spelled the end to that short-lived career but she always had a great interest in the sport and kept up to date on what was happening here and overseas in the years that followed.
In between all of this, Donna spent five years achieving firstly a Diploma and then a Bachelor Degree in Counselling and Psychotherapy and this knowledge became an invaluable asset as she worked with riders of all levels in many different disciplines – from helping people regain confidence to coaching top level competitors develop the mind set crucial in getting to and staying st the top of their game.
In late 2017, a health issue required that Donna wind back on her hectic schedule of training reiners and English horses, breeding, coaching and clinics. She bred her last Quarter horse foal in 2018 and homed all of her breeding stock with the intention of just riding a few here and there. She focussed on training select outside horses and coaching while just riding and showing a reiner or two and one or two English show hacks of her own. With the arrival of Covid in 2019, she decided to retire from training outside horses and coaching entirely.
The desire to scale back even more resulted in the sale of the bigger farm at Nar Nar Goon in early 2021 and the purchase of a boutique 20 acre farm in Koo Wee Rup.
Always having the greatest admiration for the difficulty of the reined cowhorse classes – which required a horse that could rein, cut and go down the fence, she was finally able to find the time to pursue this discipline properly. The initial idea of having a crack at cow events, bloomed into a complete fascination with all of the cowhorse disciplines – the cowhorse, cutting and drafting - and she has begun the challenge of learning and competing at two of these disciplines – cowhorse and cutting. Although she feels she still has so much to learn, she enjoyed considerable success at ARCHA events with wins and placings in Cowhorse Derbies, Maturities and non pro classes last season on her beautiful big gelding Prince of Catts. The pair also just missed out on Top Ten in the inaugural Australia’s Greatest Horsewoman – which involves doing reining, cutting, extreme cowboy racing and cowhorse events, however in 2023, from forty odd competitors (many being half Donnas age) the pair came third with only 1.5 points between the first three.
It wasn’t long before the passion to breed superlative athletes returned, which has led Donna to intensely research and study, watching and learning from the best in the industry about what it takes for a horse to be a world class cutting horse. She began the search for a handful of special broodmares that had to fit a strict criterion. With the experience that comes from riding, training and breeding successful high level purpose bred horses for over forty years comes the knowledge of how to blend the right bloodlines and consistently produce horses that can excel in the discipline they have been bred for. This knowledge is now being applied to the breeding program here at Jamuna, where Donna is striving to produce horses that have the innate cowsense, soundness, intelligence and extreme athletic ability ( the agility and strength to control a cow in the pen and the speed and power to rate one down the fence or out in the drafting arena) required to be a super star cutter, cowhorse or drafter.
Donna’s philosophy throughout the years of successfully breeding high level Arabians, reiners, show horses, show and working dogs and group winning greyhounds is that, without doubt, the damline is of the upmost importance. While clearly the selection of the right sire for every breeding is paramount, here at Jamuna the greatest importance is placed on the mare and the strength and consistency of the lines behind her – her dam, grand dam and so on.
With this in mind, a great deal of thought, research, time and finances have gone into sourcing and obtaining a select group of elite mares – many performed themselves but ALL from some of the best damlines available in the country.
2022 saw Donna competing on her first cutting events on the amazing little mare Bobbys San Badger. The pair have enjoyed success culminating in running a 147 at Myrtleford and winning their first buckle. A two year search for a top level aged event mare resulted in the purchase of the very talented Lady Vivian who spent time being campaigned by Dean Holden in her Open aged events of Donna, as she learnt more about the sport on Badge. Donna will begin showing her in 2024.
Let the journey begin……..
