Far Hills Pintado Baroque Pinto, Friesian and Friesian Sports Horse Stud

Far Hills Pintado Stud is a small family orientated stud focusing on top quality competition horses with colour, level headed enough to be valued equine companions for the whole family to enjoy.

We have always loved the beautiful Baroque Pinto's being bred overseas. Especially the late stallion Nico from Hidden Promise Sports Horse Stud.

In 2011 we purchased our first Friesian mare and she has now our first Baroque Pinto filly to our Imported Homozygous Tobiano KWPN stallion, Zerro :)

Due to all the interest we had in this foal we have decided to branch out and have our own Baroque Pinto breeding program within Far Hills Pintado Stud.

Also referred to as Barock Pinto and Baroque Pinto. The Barockpinto is a perfect all-round family horse, the original type aims for the greatest amount of Friesian blood and characteristics, predominately over 90% with the colour coming from the infusion of the original dutch warmblood. These days the Barockpinto is again influenced by the inclusion of warmblood to produce a lighter sportier type horse for those who prefer this.

The main line introduced to maintain the colour is the Samber breeding or the KWPN Warmblood. It goes without saying that the more Warmblood you mix with the Barockpinto the "hotter" the horse will be, so it is really up to you as to which type of Barockpinto you would like, the original high Friesian % or the more modern sportier models crossed with warmblood.

Because of the admirable characteristics of the Barockpinto it makes them ideal family members, circus/trick horses, show horses, vaulting, riding and driving horses.



A Brief History

The original Barockpinto is the 1957 stallion Bonte Nico (also known as Nico van Friesland), his mother was a purebred Friesian and his father was a Groninger (original native Dutch Warmblood which KWPN horses descend from). From here, all true Barockpinto's descend. In the 1960's Bonte Nico and his owner Pieter Simon Hellinga Irnsum was the most popular and controversial horse in all of Holland.

He was recognised in the Dutch Warmblood program but was later disqualified at the request of farmers who were afraid of their own breeding. However this did not stop the popularity of Bonte Nico when not a week went by without a mention of him in the papers - "milk prices are falling, but Bonte Nico is still on the way up"!!!

The Responsible Breed Federation did not want to see a coloured groninger stallion as an ancestor and therefore revoked his breeding permission. This did not detere mare owners since the coloured horses were so popular and Bonte Nico continued to breed more mares than ever. Another failed attempt at Breeding rights approval saw PS Hellinga threatened by the Breeding Federation to castrate or kill Bonte Nico.

Finally Bonte Nico succeeded in gaining special breeding approval again where he then covered 118 mares in 100 days and he finally entered the breeding register again at 9 years of age.

We hope you also fall in love with this beautiful breed.