MAGPIE'S LAST COLT.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVII, Issue 8, 8 December 1936, Page 10

MAGPIE'S LAST COLT.

FIRST TO WIN THE DERBIES. TALKING MAY GAIN MORE RENOWN. (By "Moturoa.") Mr F. P. Miller, owner of the famous ICia Ora Stud at Scone (N.S.W.), paid a big prico for tho Dark Ronald horse Magpie, but Magpie was a most profitable proposition, and since tho 1922-23 season his progeny have woti nearly 700 races worth almost £300,000. Few sires in modern times have enjoyed a greater measure of success in Australia than Magpie, and few have been more highly regarded by breeders. Magpie, who is now defunct, sired winners of every race of importance in tho Commonwealth —sprinters, iriiddledistanco horses and stayers—and no better known names are there in colonial racing in this century than Windbag and Chatham.

Magpie sired not only winners of all tho big handicap events in Australia and New Zealand, but he sired winners of practically every classic and w.f.a. event except tho Derbies —until 1936. It was remarkable that such a versatile sire, securing the best blood in tho two colonies to be mated with, and consistently Hiring winners of the highest calibre, should havo missed a blue riband success in the long years he did stud duty in Australia. Possibly it was because his sprinters were sprinters, pure and simple; and his stayers were genuinely endowed with stamina that did not reach its peak until well on in his representatives' three-year-old careers. In sounds like a fairy tale, but truth is ever stranger than fiction —tho last mare to bo mated with Magpie at the stud was the New Zealand-bred Society. He died before the new mating season began. The result of the union with the daughter of Absurd and Class was Talking, the sensational colt of the year, who, after winning tho A.J.C. Derby from Mala and Gold Rod (tho considered unbeatable certainty) was sold for £19,000; won the V.R.C. Derby and was a pronounced failure in the Melbourne Cup, in which he broke down.

Talking has made a wonderful recovery and will probably ho on hand to contest the St. Legers, which appear to lie at his mercy. All going well he may visit America next season. Thus it was that Magpie, one of the greatest of latter day sires, begat his only Derby winner at the eleventh hour, and there is yet time for his final mating to prove a world beater, for Pbar Lap, lost a Melbourne Lup as a three-year-old, but trained on to become the greatest stakes winner ever produced in the colonies.