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AMANDA WOOTEN of Supply gets cozy with
Indian Summer on the mare's birthday Friday.
Amanda is the daughter of Juanita Bellows of
Supply.
3C)-Year-Old Mare Continues To Earn Her
Keep ? Even On Her Birthday
BY LYNN CARLSON
When a lady reaches a certain age.
she generally prefers that not too
much of a fuss be made over her
birthdays ? especially when her age is even
ly divisible by 10.
This past Friday, the beautiful three-quar
ter Arabian mare Indian Summer turned 30
and marked the occasion as she does every
other day ? working with children and
adults of an equestrian bent.
"Indian," as the children in day camp at
Farwinds Stables call her, is a fixture at the
Thomasboro stables, having been in the care
of owner Lynn Petch for more than 28 yean.
"She is used every day in lessons," said
Petch, who compares the mare to The
Horse With Silver Shoes," from a children's
story about a magical horse who grants the
wishes of deserving children.
"We should all hope to end our days hav
ing played such a role in so many lives as
this priceless old mare and her companion
professional school horses," Petch added.
"There's been one in the life of every horse
man or horsewoman in the world."
A horse is considered aged at 20, and few
are used regularly past 30. So-called "senior
horses" make up about 10 percent of the
U.S. horse population, according to a Purina
Mills manager who recently identified and
recognized 2,000 senior horses in a nation
wide search for the best-loved older horses.
They're often calmer and more pre
dictable than younger horses and make great
companions for children, the physically
challenged and inexperienced riders," said
Purina 's John Hamilton.
Petch didn't know about the search or she
surely would have entered her beloved
Indian. But the prize ? a year's supply of
Equine Senior Horse Feed ? would have
been unnecessary for the old mare had she
won. She still has all her teeth.
"She is never sick, so maybe she'll be in
the running next year," Petch said.
On this milestone birthday, Indian Sum
mer is working the day camp beat, circling
the ring for two midsummer morning hours
with 6- and 7-year-olds on her back and at
her side. She wears a tiara of leaves the little
BIRTHDAY CAKES and soft drinks are enjoyed by riding students and their
counselors in honor of a beloved old chestnut i
girls have fashioned in her honor.
"I bought her at 20 months and trained
her to ride, the first Arabian horse I had
owned," Pttch said. "I sold her to Margo
Woodin of Mebane, who left her with us and
in our care at Pine Knoll Stables in Durham.
"Students leased and showed her, qualify
ing her for the Nationals (the annual U.S.
championship Arabian horse show) several
time. This was during the very earlier surge
in popularity of this breed in North Carolina,
in the '60b and '70s.
"In 1973, Ms. Woodin offered her to us,
but we felt we couldn't afford her at the time
since we had just moved to Brunswick
County. A former student in Durham bought
her and took her to the Nationals, in effect
placing top 20 in her breed in two cate
gories"
Indian Summer came to be owned by the
first Brunswick County student of Petch and
husband Richard. When that student, Sarah
Williamson (then Sarah Stanaland), "took up
more adventurous pursuits on horseback," as
Petch puts it, the family gave Indian
Summer to the Petches in 1978 "at token
cost with a promise on our part that Sarah's
little sister Elizabeth would have a lifetime
supply of riding lessons."
The horse been there ever since. Petch
said she learned long ago that constantly
buying and selling horses made her feel
"like a movie star who's had ten husbands."
She stopped all that trading and Indian
Summer became a member of the family for
good. "She'll die here," Petch says matter
of-factly.
That day seems far away on a steamy but
beautiful July morning under a canopy of
trees with the sounds of the Highway 17
four-laning project barely audible in the dis
tance.
Sara Suda rides Indian for the first hour,
followed by Joshua Smith. Other children
fawn over the old girl, brushing her still
silky coat and singing the birthday song.
Indian Summer takes it without a trace of
annoyance, every bit the grand dame of the
place.
The mare takes to her stall after the les
son, oblivious to the noisy TWinkies-and-so
da party the children are having over in the
picnic shelter. Not a bad life, indeed.
-V +**"
LYNN FETCH has cmrS for a?
owned Indian Summer far 28 of the
rfr 30 years.
Cetacean Awareness Program
Seeking Dolphin-Counfers
For Census
Cetacean Awareness Programs, a group
studying bottlenose dolphins along the
North Carolina coast since 1989, is planning
North Carolina's largest "dolphin watch" to
date this Saturday, July 9.
"Day of the Dolphin" is the project name
that involves public volunteers in an effort
to leant more about the dolphins that inhabit
areas of the Ttar Heel coastline.
Cetacean Awareness Programs has con
ducted 20 dolphin sighting events along the
North Carolina Coast during the past five
years. The "Day of the Dolphin" project
helps scientists and educators generate data
about load dolphin populations and creates
further awareness about dolphins.
The North Carolina dolphin watch is co
ordinated with simultaneous efforts involv
ing seven other East Coast states. On
Saturday, volunteer teams will line the
bcaches from New Jersey to Florida in an
effort to count dolphins as part of a dolphin
census organized by the Atlantic Dolphin
Research Cooperative in an attempt <o as
sess the dolphin population along the Atlan
tic coast.
The North Carolina study area includes
the beaches from Shallotte Inlet north to
Beaufort Inlet, approximately 100 miles of
coastline.
To participate in the North Carolina dol
phin watch, volunteers must attend an orien
tation meeting July 8. Those interested in
counting dolphins at Holden, Long or
Yaupon beaches should attend the meeting
at Morton Hall on the UNC- Wilmington
campus at 7 p.m. Friday.
For more information or to pre-regisler,
call Cetacean Awareness Programs at
(910)458-4700.
1
The Two Colorful Tulip Shell Types
SBY BILL FAVER
ome of the most colorful shells found
on the Branswick County beaches are
the two tulip shells we occasionally
find along the high tide
I line. The larger of the
I two, the Tulip Shell or
I "True Tulip" carries the
I scientific name
I Fasciolaria tulipa. The
I smaller, which is more
I abundant, is the Banded
I Tulip, Fasciolarm
I hunteria.
Both tulips have
FAVE> strong, thick shells.
They are spindle-shaped, like the Florida
Horse Conch, which is a member of the
same family of shells. The True Tulip is
smooth cxccpi for several narrow spiral
grooves below the opening where the
surface is wrinkled. The Banded Tulip is
entirely smooth. In size, the True Tulip is
larger, growing to 10 inches long and 4
inches wide. The Banded Tulip is much
smaller, about 3 inches long and more more
than I'A inches wide.
The True Tulip can vary in color from
pinkish-gray to orange-red with brown
spots and broken spiral bands of a brownish
color. The Banded Tulip can be cream to
bluish-greenish-gray to orange-brown with
widely separated, thin brown unbroken
spiral bands. The animal inside the Banded
Tulip is Mack with white speckles and the
operculum used to seal the animal inside
the shell is homy and brown.
Both species live in grassy and sandy
bottoms from the low tide line to well
offshore and in sounds and bays. Range of
both is from North Carolina to Florida and
to Texas and in the West Indies. The
Banded Tulip is found also in the Bahamas
and Yucatan.
Egg capsules arc formed from a pore in
the foot of the female. Several dozen eggs
are pUced in each capsule and the capsules
are attached to a rock or a shell. Most of the
eggs are unfertilized and become food for
the young snails when they hatch after
about a month.
Both species are aggressive predators in
the sea community. Slow and deliberate in
their movements, the tulips feed on other
snails and some bivalves. They, in turn, are
eaten by the Florida Horse Conch.
The best time to find good specimens of
the tulips is following rough seas after a
storm. Look for them along the high tide
line or just at the water's edge when the
tide is out.
Live shells should be returned to the sea.
You may want to keep one in some sea
water for a day or two to see if it will
emerge from the shell and then return it to
its habitat.
TULIP SHELLS are among the most cotorful shells we find.