One of my neighbors is the San Cristobal Ranch in Lamy, New Mexico, which is owned by Singleton Ranches.
From their website:
“The Singleton Ranches started in 1986 when Dr. Henry Singleton purchased the famous San Cristobal Ranch near Santa Fe, New Mexico. In addition to breeding and raising good cows and horses, Dr. Singleton wanted country that preserved the ranching heritage brought to New Mexico over 400 years ago. Purchases of land grants in New Mexico and California over the years have resulted in assembling more than 1,000,000 acres of ranch country. Dr. Singleton passed away in 1999, but fortunately today his five children continue to operate the ranches as he wished. Caroline, Singleton’s wife of 57 years, was also actively involved in the ranching business until her death in 2007.
“Singleton Ranches is one of the top five operations in the United States in terms of total acreage and cattle numbers.
“The Singleton Ranch horse division, located at the San Cristobal Ranch, includes a complete breeding and training facility. We have over 40 American Quarter Horse broodmares that enable us to produce horses for the cowboys. Breeding to these mares are two ranch stallions: Dualwithme (Dual Pep x Smart Little Lena) and Timber Cat 101 (Docs Hickory x High Brow Cat).”
Grant Mitchell is the ranch and horse program manager (his wife is Connie), and Terry Riddle is the horse training manager. While they have a good cattle operation the horses are what they are increasingly becoming famous for. They produce all around great horses with a lot of cow sense in their breeding program and then the ranch cowboys use all of the new horses to do actual ranch and cattle work so they develop balance, athleticism and confidence. Only after that training are they available for sale. Some of the top horse experts like Les Vogt and Bob Avila regularly work with the ranch and give clinics for the ranch cowboys and some of us local folks. The program goal is to develop a better horse every year.
This is an outstanding operation. If you’re in the market for a performance horse please check them out at Singleton Ranches.
There is a National Versatility Ranch Horse Association clinic and competition at the ranch August 14-16. I’ve written about the NVRHA HERE.
There is a wonderful book about the history of the ranch and the surrounding area that you can find at amazon.com.