NOTES FROM RICCARTON

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26692, 11 February 1948, Page 8

NOTES FROM RICCARTON

BRUCE IN VETERINARY HANDS Special to the Daily Times CHRISTCHURCH, Feb. 10. J. A. Wilson will take Royal Robe, as well as Beau Son, when he leaves tomorrow night for Greymouth. In the meantime, the two horses are daiiy visitors to the tracks at Riccarton. Mysterious Melody and Sedgemere have gone to Wingatui, where they will be trained by R. Heasley. Sedgemere may be got ready for jumping races, as before he left Riccarton he had shown some aptitude for hurdling. Bruce,, who has been spelling for more than two months, is on the sick list. He was fopnd last week to be suffering from ergot poisoning and L. J. Ellis has brought him back to his stables, where he is receiving veterinary attention. Mr J. H. Grigg has sold two of his three-year-olds and they will go to Australia. They are . Footlights, a speedy filly by Theio from Opera Star, and Full Moon, a gelding by Nizami from Aurora Borealis, winner of the Grand National Steeplechase. Footlights has engagements at Greymouth, but* her trip has been cancelled and she will go to Australia without doing any more racing. Mr D. McFarlane has sold the lour-year-old mare Palm Bearer, by Coronach from Cocoanut, an Australian- bred mare by The Nut. Palm Bearer won her first three races as a two-year-old and she wound up her three-year-old season with three good performances at Riccarton. running second in the Sockburn Handicap, after which she won the Dominion and Great Autumn Handicaps. She has not struck form this season, having been unplaced in each of her 10 starts. Desert Victory and Martial Note, two of the winners at Riccarton last Saturday, are six-year-old Battle Song geldings and in each case the dam is a Paper Money mare. They were both bred in South Canterbury and they were sold at Trentham as yearlings five years ago. Desert Victory, from Helen Gold, was bred by Miss J. Edgar Jones, and Mr M. J. Moodabe paid 700 guineas for him, while the same Auckland owner paid 550 guineas for Martial Note, bred by Mr J. Cameron and from Endorse. The two colts were placed with the Taranaki trainer, H. Dulieu, but some time later Mr Moodabe sold them and they came back to the. South Island. Desert Victory was raced by Mr E. B. Rawlings, without much luck, as he won only one race He was sold recently to the Washdyke trainer, W. P. Hogan, for whom he ran second at Hororata and then won at Riccarton last week. He looks like winning more races. Martial Note, now owned and trained on the West Coast, has had two successes in Canterbury, the first of them in the colours of Mr A. J. Tritton, at Motukarara, in the spring of 1946. Then, as at Riccarton on Saturday, the distance was seven furlongs and second place was filled by Irish Note, who. a week later, won the Stewards Handicap at Riccarton. Martial Note will get more money if he remains sound.