[music playing] Kelly: On this Paw Report Classic, we leave our studios, and travel to Lovington, Illinois, for a trip to Farrell Farms, to meet Phil Farrell, and his family of Clydesdale Horses.

Phil and his horses are known world-wide, and coming up, we'll explain why this majestic, working breed, is so popular.

[music playing] Chrissy: Finding a soluton for your pets behavior problem, can be confusing.

Dr. Sally J. Foote helps you help your pet.

Private consultation and resources are available at drsallyjfoote.com.

Foote and Friends, better bond, better behavior.

Katelyn: Fetchers Pet Supply on the north side of the Charleston square.

Serving the EIU community since 1991.

Fetchers welcomes all pets on a leash.

Is open seven days a week and offers made in the USA food.

Pets supplies for dogs, cats, reptiles, and fish.

Fetchers Pets Supply in Charleston.

Rameen: The Paw Report on WEIU is supported by Rural King, America's farm and home store, livestock feed, farm equipment, pet supplies and more.

You can find your store and more information regarding Rural King at ruralking.com.

Rob: Dave's Decorating Center is a proud supporter of the Paw Report on WEIU.

Dave's Decorating Center features the Mohawk Smartstrand Silk Forever Clean carpet.

Dave's Decorating Center, authorized Mohawk color center in Charleston.

Kelly: We decided to take our show on the road and we are in Lovington, Illinois at Farrell Farms, and a familiar guest joins us on the episode today.

We're joined by Phil Farrell.

You may remember him from a few years back, another production we produce here at WEIU, Heartland Highways.

We came out, visited the farm and talked to you a little bit then about the Clydesdale.

As I produce the shows and come up with topics, you came to mind again, and I thought, "I'm gonna give Phil a call and decide if we could come out and see the farm again and maybe see your horses again.

I just remember that day fondly, going up to the fence and the big Clydesdales coming over and sniffing and wanting a treat every now and then, so thanks for joining us, Phil.

Phil: Good to have you here.

Kelly: We are on the farm of a very historic and old farm that's been in your family for many, many years.

Tell us about the history of where we're at today and how it's evolved over the years.

Phil: Our family settled here in 1850.

Farm was purchased from the government.

Since that time, there's always been horses and livestock.

Mostly dairy cattle, some sheep and goats here and there.

During that time, every generation has broken trained horses, done farrier work, made shoes, put shoes on horses.

Kind of anything you can do with horses and livestock, we've done here, I guess.

That's just passed on to every generation basically.

Kelly: You've always had Clydesdales, but Clydesdale isn't the only type of workhorse that you've had here.

You've had other ... You've had a lot of breeds here.

Phil: We have, and over the years, we've handled live horses, ponies, all kind of saddle horses, show horses, race horses.

We have a large variety of customers and clients that we are buyers, sellers, agents for as well as training and transportation and also we get to see a lot of different things, a lot of different places, a lot of different kinds of horses and customer needs and wants and so we've handled a lot of different breeds.

Kelly: Let's talk specifically about the breed of the Clydesdale.

What is the history of this majestic animal?

It dates back hundreds of years.

Phil: Yeah, they've been around a long time.

They were developed in Scotland near the River Clyde in Lanarkshire and as I understand it, Lanarkshire translates to meaning "Clydesdale," is how the name came about.

There are recordings in studbooks back as far as at least 1837 where the stallions were used to breed mares in that area.

Then in about 1877, I believe it was, an association society was started in Scotland to record and track and register all the horses.

1879, the US started association to do the same thing.

They've been around a long time.

Kelly: Their trip to the US was not an easy one.

As you can imagine, trying to get that big of an animal to the States was quite the challenge.

Phil: It really was.

Horses don't do well riding on ships.

I don't know if it's the sea leg thing or what, but a lot of them got sick.

There was a death loss on every shipment on the early shipments.

We fly all the horses nowadays.

They do very well on planes, but there's no one that I know that tries to bring them across the sea now.

Kelly: That's what they tried to do from Scotland.

Phil: They did do that.

They did do that.

They were successful with horses, but like I say, there were a lot of problems.

They didn't lose all of them, and at one point there was a ship that was lost at sea that had, I think, 25 head on and lost all of those.

As time progressed, more and more people wanted to bring them into the US and it did to get the breed started here.

I say "more and more people."

I mean, when I was a kid, there wasn't that many being raised, actually, so it's not like there's a vast majority.

Even today there's between four and 500 foals a year registered, is all that there is.

There are guesstimates.

There's maybe 5,000 head in North America, so theoretically they qualify to be on the watch list because of the low numbers, but the reality is there's not any problem barring any major, major disaster that would eliminate the breed at this point.

Kelly: Take us through their origin in the US.

Phil: Like I say, early on, back in the late 1800s, there were several guys that brought some in.

The most famous was during prohibition when the Busch family brought the original hitch horses in.

Got a wagon and harness and altogether and presented it to their dad.

At the end of prohibition, they took the hitch to Washington, DC with the first legal case of beer to present to the guys there in Washington.

Budweiser of course is the most well known of any of them.

They have traveled to all corners of the US, been in Canada, and they, at any given time, had, over the years, kept probably in the vicinity of 200 head, counting the horses on the road as well as the breeding farm.

At one point they kept three eight horse hitches traveling, and then they would have hitches go out to special events from St. Louis or one of their other breweries.

They kept horses at all the breweries and Busch Gardens and Sea World and all of that, and that's been back down now since the company was sold as well, but it's an icon and they're still using them and still advertising.

I doubt there's very many people in the US or Canada that doesn't know who the Budweiser Clydesdales are.

Kelly: They're just so majestic in stature.

That leads me to my next question about their characteristics.

What can you tell us about ...

I mean, we know the feather feet, the white on their bodies, which is just so awesome to look at, but how big are they?

How big do they get?

How much do they eat a day?

Phil: Mature ones will weigh two thousand to 22, 23 hundred.

They will probably average 18 hands tall at the withers, which is at the base of the mane at the neck.

A hand is four inches, so if you envision what 18 hands would be, that's a very big horse.

Because of the show ring and just everybody wanting everything bigger these days, there are a lot of horses that are now pushing 19 hands.

That's kind of the popular thing, they bigger you can get them to be, the more popular they are.

Kelly: What about their coloring?

You said that's evolved over time.

Phil: It has.

In the early days, nobody cared much what color they were.

They were rone, they were speckled spotted, they were brown, black, the bays, like Budweiser has.

With the popularity of Budweiser having solid color with the white stripe and the white legs, that kind of evolved.

Everyone else wanted to do that too, so that is by far the most popular.

Most people today try to breed them for solid color, whether it's solid bay like Budweiser or brown or black.

There still are that are rone and speckled around.

There are still some that have black legs around.

Even though you try to breed a solid color with white legs and a white face, there's throwbacks.

Every year you get a throwback or two, so ... Kelly: I remember the last time you and I chatted and I was asking you about their temperament, which I want you to expand upon, you said, "The best way I can describe it is they're just oversized dogs.

They're always in your pocket."

I remember that quote from you.

What's their mannerisms?

Phil: Well, they are like that.

They are like a big pet.

They're very, very friendly.

They always want to come over and see what you're doing or if you've got a treat for them or whatever.

For the most part, they're very easy to get along with.

That even expands into breaking and training and all.

If you go kind of slow and easy with them, they are very responsive, generally, to whatever you want to do, but they're very laid back.

I'd say in having handled most breeds of horses, they are close to the number one, as far as their laid back temperament.

Kelly: Not real nippy or bitey because sometimes I've been around horses where they, I don't know if "nip" is the right word, but they do like to kind of bite at you and snort at you, but it's not that I've been around your horses all that much, but they're just so friendly.

THat's the only way that I can describe it.

Phil: They are.

The whole breed is that way, generally.

Kelly: What about feeding?

Something so massive probably has to eat a lot.

Phil: They do.

They expect to get fed every day, twice a day or more.

They will eat, depending on the entire ration, whether they're on a pasture or not, but 10 to 15 pounds of grain, at least, a day.

Some of them more than that.

They can very easily eat a bale of hay a day.

We feed a very high protein hay and feed some alfalfa in the hay.

It just seems to help keep their condition and all.

Yeah, they like their feed.

Kelly: You have a special little one in the area behind us.

In fact, you have several young ones.

I'll let you talk about that, but you do have a special one behind us.

I don't know where ...

They might have head back in the barn to get some cool air, but you've been up.

You haven't had much sleep in the last three months.

Phil: Right.

Yeah, he refused to nurse his mother, so we started out feeding him with a bottle.

I would milk out his mother into the bottle and he would take the bottle which was kind of lucky, so we did that every two hours for the first couple of weeks and then we stretched it to three hours.

That's 24 hours a day.

Then after, I think, five or six weeks, I stretched it to every four hours, and now just this week I cut out his night feedings, so I don't have to go to the barn at one o'clock in the morning now.

Kelly: So you got a few extra hours.

That's good.

Phil: Yes.

Kelly: The Clydesdale, and I keep saying "majestic."

It is, and they're just so ... You're just kind of in awe when you look at them, and I know you said a lot of times traffic will go by the farm and people will stop and just stare in the field.

I know the feeling, because they're just so beautiful, but there are other uses for Clydesdales.

Several uses, actually.

Phil: Mm-hmm.

Kelly: That dates back to when they were pulling wagons.

Phil: Right.

Well, and there still are some people that use them in the field, actually.

Some Amish folks and just some regular folks that just like Clydesdales, that still work them on small farms, and so that's a legitimate use that they actually work.

There are a couple of loggers that pull logs out of the woods with horses that use them, and they use other breeds as well.

There are a lot of carriage services that like to use Clydesdales.

They're just kind of showy in front of the fancy carriages when you're downtown and all, or at a wedding or whatever, and a lot of the circuses and petting zoos and that sort of thing that we deal with like to have a Clydesdale for one to look at because they just kind of draw people.

You've gotta go look at them or pet them or whatever, so ... Kelly: That's right.

You mentioned it early in the interview, talking about the history with Anheuser-Busch and their association with Clydesdales, but you, too, have a history.

You spent a lot of time over in St. Louis in the stables.

Phil: Yeah, in 1966 dad had the opportunity or was asked to go down to help establish their new breeding farm, just actually for the summer.

At the end of the summer, they asked him to stay on, and so he did, and it was 30 years.

He became manager in '67 of the Clydesdales, and he stayed there for 30 years before he retired and came back to the farm.

My brother and I stayed here on the farm then and then at one point they needed an assistant manager down there, so I went down for seven years and then my brother went down and I came back to the farm, so we've kept the farm going even though we've done other things too.

Kelly: Your Clydesdales have gone all over the world, and you're gonna talk about some of their travels, but you have a pretty long clientele list of some very popular people that I know our viewers know.

You have provided horses to the likes of ... Phil: Yeah, George Foreman is a client.

We took some horses to him and spent some time with him teaching him to harness and drive and take care of them and all.

Dolly Parton's group, we've supplied horses there.

Shepherd of the Hills in Branson, the heiress of Campbell's Soup and heiress of Weyerhaeuser Lumber and just kind of a whole host of people that have farms, and ... Kelly: I bet you get that phone call from George Foreman, you want to check the caller ID to make sure it's legitimate.

Phil: Sometime, and generally it's their manager or farm guys or something that actually come here and we deal with.

That was the case with Michael Jackson.

We worked with him but it was through his farm manager and all.

Kelly: His ranch.

Sure.

Phil: That's often the case.

We're dealing with some very high-level political people in other countries and in wealthy families and all in other countries and all, too, so we kind of had to learn how to deal with that and handle ourselves and all, because it's a whole different world when you're ...

It's not like selling to your neighbor, the next county or anything like that.

Kelly: How is the Clydesdale as a travel companion?

When you have to deal with your clients that are global, how do you ... That's a pretty intense travel itinerary for the Clydesdale.

Phil: Well, with them and all the breeds that we ship and deliver, there is a protocol that we have to abide by, depending on what country their going to.

It's usually a 30 day to 60 day quarantine here, whether it's our own horses or horses we've bought to deliver to somebody.

We take them to one of the approved airports and we hope it's Chicago because that's the closest, but we have shipped out of Kennedy, we've shipped out of Toronto, Miami, Seattle, LA.

It just depends on where they're going as to where they will allow us to ship out of.

Kelly: It's almost like a stall that you ride in with the horses.

Phil: It is.

It's like a two horse or three horse trailer without wheels, and they are designed so that they fit on all the roller mechanisms and all of the other equipment at the airports.

For the airport personnel, other than go a little bit slower and handle a little bit easier, it's no different than handling anything else.

Kelly: It's not throwing that baggage.

They can't do that.

Phil: Right, right.

We have had some loads that have been charter loads where we'll take 75 or 80 head on a plane and then there's one or two of us, depending on how many horses goes on the plane.

We carry our own water and feed and all, so we can take care of them in transit and all that.

Kelly: What gives you the most joy and pleasure?

I mean, you don't know a life without horses, Clydesdale.

That's all you've done.

When you think about it, it may be a question that you don't really ponder, but what gives you the most joy about these beautiful animals?

Phil: Well, I just ... Quite honestly, when we're here and nobody else is here and they're out in the field and they're just eating and everybody is healthy and happy and all, I like sitting out by the pasture and just watching them in the evenings when we're done.

That's very ... Kelly: Relaxing.

Phil: Pleasing and relaxing, yeah.

As far as different pleasure or satisfaction, I guess, is when we deliver horses to new customers and everything works well.

The new customer's happy.

They understand the horse and how to take care of them and everybody everywhere along the way is happy and so hopefully we have repeat customers, but in a lot of these countries we've gone to, we've taken the first American horses into that country ever, and the first heavy horses.

There's been six countries that we introduced Clydesdales to that Clydesdales have never been in before, so we go over and help train the people to take care of the horses and to ride or drive or whatever.

Kelly: That must give you some joy to know that there's a half a dozen countries that you're responsible for bringing the breed to.

It must make you happy.

Phil: Well, it kind of makes you feel ... Kelly: Yeah.

Phil: Feel like you maybe accomplished something, I guess.

In all these cases, and the same with all of our exports, is very, very intense from start to finish and all, so you always have a little hesitation until they are at their final destination and whoever's taking care of them there really understands how to take care of them.

We get calls routinely from even veterinarians or whoever in these other countries that have no experience with big horses in particular.

A lot of the countries don't have that much horse experience in their veterinary communities, so they call back here to Lovington and ask what to do about this or that or something else.

I find that a little unnerving sometimes.

Kelly: Legacy of Farrell Farms.

Grandkids that are interested, do they come out?

Are you teaching them everything that you know?

Phil: They can all ride and drive already.

The oldest one is 16.

The youngest one is nine, and another four grandkids.

I have a son and daughter and no doubt the farm is gonna continue on after I'm not here, so that kind of makes you feel good.

Kelly: Absolutely.

Phil Farrell of Farrell Farms here in Lovington, surrounded by sweat bees.

We were just talking about that.

The sweat bees are out in full force.

We're filming this episode in almost August, so humid weather, I think, brings them out.

Phil: Yes.

Kelly: Thank you again for sharing your knowledge of the Clydesdale and for sharing your story with our viewers here on the Paw Report.

Phil: Anytime.

Kelly: Excellent, and we thank you for joining us for this episode on the road.

If you're a veterinarian, trainer, groomer, specialist, rescue organization, or shelter that would like to partner with the Paw Report by providing expert guests for the show, please contact us by emailing weiu@weiu.net, or call 217-581-5956.

If you have a topic you'd like to see on the show or questions for our experts, contact us with those, too.

Rob: Dave's Decorating Center is a proud supporter of the Paw Report on WEIU.

Dave's Decorating Center features the Mohawk Smartstrand Silk Forever Clean carpet.

Dave's Decorating Center, authorized Mohawk color center in Charleston.

Rameen: The Paw Report on WEIU is supported by Rural King, America's farm and home store, livestock feed, farm equipment, pet supplies and more.

You can find your store and more information regarding Rural King at ruralking.com.

Katelyn: Fetchers Pet Supply on the north side of the Charleston square.

Serving the EIU community since 1991.

Fetchers welcomes all pets on a leash.

Is open seven days a week and offers made in the USA food.

Pets supplies for dogs, cats, reptiles, and fish.

Fetchers Pets Supply in Charleston.

Chrissy: Finding a soluton for your pets behavior problem, can be confusing.

Dr. Sally J. Foote helps you help your pet.

Private consultation and resources are available at drsallyjfoote.com.

Foote and Friends, better bond, better behavior.

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