Continuing Coda’s Legacy

Pony power! We are celebrating ponies of all breeds on YourDressage through the month of June! 

Did you know dressage riders who choose ponies as their mounts are eligible for many Adequan®/USDF All-Breeds Awards, as there are several pony organizations on our Participating Organization list?

Here, a rider from Region 1 shares how she came to own one of the famous Chincoteague ponies and how that pony helped heal her world after she lost her heart horse.

By Sarina Bower

I got a later start at riding than most equestrians; it wasn’t until I was in my early thirties that we were in the position to start taking lessons. Every Tuesday night, we went to a local barn, where my husband, Greg, daughter, Phaedra, and I took a group lesson to learn the basics. Before long, we were leasing a horse. It didn’t take long to realize that we were ready to find one to call our own. 

After a long search, we found our perfect partner in one of the most unexpected places. I cashed in savings bonds – some that had been gifts from the day I was born – and used that money to buy our first pony, Coda (stage name: D.C. al Coda). 

We initially got him for our daughter, who was 12 at the time, because I was under the impression that, as an adult, I needed “a real horse.” Very quickly, it became clear that their partnership was just not in the cards. But Coda and I? We were a match made in heaven. 

Coda was the most perfect, most beautiful, most ideal pony I could have ever asked for, but he was basically green-broke when we brought him home. He was a nose-to-tail trail pony, and all he knew was how to follow the horse in front of him. We began our training two steps forward at a time. 

Over the next four years, our bond became unbreakable, and he was my world. I never went a day without spending time with him; whether we were riding or just hand grazing, we were just enjoying spending time together. 

Our equine family grew soon after, as we added a rescue Appaloosa for Phaedra and, a year later, added a partner for Greg, a rescue that we think was a racehorse in his early years. In 2018, we decided that we were ready to add one more to our crew. 

By this time, I was completely sold on ponies, with their mischievous personalities and fierce loyalty… and it helped that they were a lot closer to the ground in the event of a fall. It had been a lifelong dream of mine to have a Chincoteague Pony, so we started doing some research and decided that we were going to buy a foal from Pony Penning. 

Pony Penning is an annual event on Chincoteague Island, Virginia. It was an event made famous by Marguerite Henry’s novel, Misty of Chincoteague. The Chincoteague Volunteer Fire Company has an agreement with the park services to graze up to 150 adult ponies on the Virginia side of Assateague Island. These ponies are rounded up three times per year for vet checks and farrier work.

In July each year, after they are rounded up, they make their way to the south end of the island and, at slack tide, they begin the swim from Assateague to Memorial Park on Chincoteague Island. It is only about five minutes from the time the first pony hits the water to when the last pony exits. 

I wasn’t a huge fan of the pony swim until we actually visited the island, saw the event, and talked to the people who live there, as well as help with it every year. We were all surprised at how short the distance is that the ponies actually swim, and by the fact that the ponies will sometimes go swimming on their own at other times of the year. 

Once rested from the swim, the ponies are herded to the carnival grounds and held in paddocks overnight for the auction the following morning. Those that are too young, too old, or that the vets think should not swim are loaded onto a trailer to be transported to the carnival grounds to meet up with the rest of the herds. The Fire Company uses the auction to help control the island’s pony population and raise funds for new equipment. The 2024 event will mark the 99^th annual pony swim. 

We knew that we would be priced out of the auction, so we planned to go down for the October roundup, which is when the foals born after the July roundup are sold. We just happened to already have a planned family vacation to Chincoteague that August, so we planned to get information on how the fall round-up worked and what we needed to do to purchase a foal at that time. 

On our first day of vacation, we stopped in at the Beebe Ranch (yes, THE Beebe Ranch from the Misty books!) to visit with Billy and Bonnie Beebe, the owners of the ranch, who had become friends of ours during previous visits. 

Billy was excited to show off his new “surprise” foal, born just seven days prior, to a mare whom the previous owner could not care for any longer due to health issues. We saw a stunning sorrel pinto, with one brown eye and one blue eye, and legs for days. They were calling him Chip, because their grandchildren thought he looked like chocolate chip cookie dough. 

For me, it was love at first sight. We ended up returning the next day to visit with him, and also help Billy with barn chores. That second day, I made an offer for him. After a lot of discussion between our family and theirs, it was decided that Chip would join our herd once he was weaned. 

My dream of owning my very own Chincoteague pony came true on December 22nd, 2018, when we brought our (literally) bouncing baby boy home to Pennsylvania. Santa finally brought me a pony for Christmas! 

Although he was not born on Assateague as a feral pony, both his dam and sire were born there, and they had made “the swim” years earlier. His sire, Hurricane Charley’s Legacy, and his dam, Black Pearl of Assateague, both ended up at the same farm before they were rehomed because of their owner’s declining health. We decided that his registered name was going to be Legacy’s Island Renegade, but we would still call him Chip. 

Our first two years together were all about survival, and there were many times that I thought to myself, “What on earth have I done?” Every single thing was new to him. Phaedra and I worked with him on leading and good ground manners. We introduced him to some small trail obstacles, and tried to expose him to as many new elements as possible. Sometimes, I would just bring him into the arena to watch me work with Coda, and I truly believe that helped set him up for future success. 

By the time he was two, we were able to take him on trail rides with us. I would pony him off of Coda, and any time he got out of line, Coda would give him a quick correction. Chip was always happy to be with his big “brother,” even when Coda wasn’t as happy to have his pesky little brother tagging along. I called them “Big C” and “Little C.”

While Chip was growing and learning his manners, Coda and I were working our way up through the levels of dressage, and we dabbled in a little bit of jumping. In 2020, we qualified for a big hunter show in three different divisions and had the time of our lives. We even brought home a second-place finish in a very competitive class. We were training First Level dressage at home, and I was so excited to show the following spring. 

Around November 2020, I began to notice some changes in Coda, and we started down the rabbit hole of trying to find a diagnosis. Unfortunately, an autoimmune disease had come on fast and strong, and it was not playing fair. I spent Christmas day hand-walking and cold-hosing him, trying to keep his fever down, and the next morning, we made a trip to Cornell University Veterinary Specialists, where he would ultimately be hospitalized for eight days. 

Life is not fair; oftentimes, it can be downright cruel. Some of the best veterinarians in the country couldn’t fix Coda. I could not visit him at the hospital because of strict COVID restrictions, so I asked them to stabilize my best friend so that I could bring him home to say goodbye. 

I will never in my life forget the moment that he stepped off the trailer at home, and my three other horses came running and called out to him. It was one of the most pure, beautiful things I have ever seen. We had another ten days together before he told me he was tired and it was time to say goodbye. It was the worst day of my life. As I lay with him, I told him how much I loved him, thanked him for changing my life, and assured him that I would never forget him. 

And then the bottom dropped out of my world. 

The darkness of the next several weeks was crushing. Our new normal was not a normal that I wanted, and during this time, I almost walked away from riding for good. I was not only mourning the loss of my best friend but the future that we had together. I felt like we got ripped off – cheated out of all of the great things we were going to do together. Sure, I had my two big horses and little Chip, but none of them could fill the hole that Coda left behind. 

Over the next several months, little by little and without me even realizing it, Chip began to help soften the sharp edges of that hole. For two years, Coda had taught him how to pony, and Chip was on a mission to remind me of this. I started working with him more and more. 

Unlike Coda, Chip needs to learn most things the hard way, and when left to his own devices, he can get himself into trouble. He has grabbed a rake and chased the big horses around the pasture with it, has come up with over a dozen different ways to shred a blanket, and one time climbed a stack of hay bales as if he were a goat and stood on the top with his head literally in the rafters. My husband and I had to brainstorm how to get him down from there; we ended up deciding to have my husband climb up and hang on to his halter while I stayed at the bottom and pulled hay bales off the stack one at a time while they “rode” the hay back down to the ground. Once down, he shook off and turned around to do it again. After that, he was not allowed to go with me while I was filling hay bags. 

Around the time he was two and a half, we started preparing him to carry a saddle. Because of all the work we had put in in the months and years before, none of it was a surprise to him. He never once bucked or otherwise reacted to wearing a saddle. Around the time he was three, I sat on him for the first time. Again, he did not react at all. He stood still and calm, as if he was saying, “I got this, Mom.” My daughter and I decided we were going to do all of his training because we didn’t want anyone to break his beautiful [read: exuberant] spirit that I adored so much. 

My daughter and I spent several months taking turns, with one riding and one leading, basically giving each other pony rides. We eventually moved on to the lunge line, and after an awful lot of work, we were able to ride him one to two laps at a time around the arena independently. 

Once he was walking for us and we made sure he had a good handle on “whoa,” we were able to add little stints of trotting here and there. Everything we did, we did slowly and followed his lead. We wanted to make sure we were developing him for the long haul, not to get quick results. 

He made his first trip down centerline with me in June of 2022, and in July of 2022, my daughter rode him at the Pennsylvania State 4-H Dressage Championship show. Going into that show, we weren’t even sure if they were going to make it into the ring. She was nervous, with it being his first time at such a big show, and I was nervous because he had not been training under saddle for very long.

All of our hard work and preparation paid off, and they ended up riding Introductory Test A beautifully – missing qualifying for the final competition the next day by only 0.5%. We were absolutely over the moon that they had even made it through the test, let alone scored so well! That following September, I rode Intro Test A and B with him, and we ended up in the top five in both tests, scoring higher than some horses that had been in training since before he was even born. 

Every time we ride, he just gets better and better. We started adding in little bits of the canter in 2023, and because we don’t have a lot of dressage opportunities in our immediate area, I rode him at some local hunter shows to get some experience. To my surprise, we qualified for the same big hunter show that Coda and I had attended just three years prior. We competed at that show with a lock of Coda’s mane on Chip’s bridle, and their photos hang side by side in our home. 

For 2024, we have been focusing mostly on dressage and competing at new shows, where we have met some really wonderful people. Most would never guess that I am riding a Chincoteague pony because they are typically thought of as being short, round, and hairy – but that is just not the case! 

Chip stands around 13.3 hands right now and still seems to have a little growing to do. My vet has said he is the biggest Chincoteague pony she has ever seen. I think what surprises people the most is that he may not be 16.2, but he is a very fancy mover, and has scored plenty of 8s – and even a 10! – in his tests. Ponies can be just as capable and athletic as larger horses, and are super intelligent. Now, I always encourage people not to write them off as being just for kids.

It has been a rough road, starting from the very bottom and working our way through all of the hard things to get back up to the level of competition that I was used to competing at. What I have realized, though, is that it’s all about the journey to get there. When Chip is ready, we will compete at the recognized shows that I dream of competing in. 

In the meantime, I am going to enjoy every minute that I am lucky enough to have with him. He continues to carry the torch that Coda lit, and for that, I am forever thankful.

The fire company holds two additional roundups on Assateague throughout the year: one in the spring and one in the fall. These roundups allow them to perform health checks on all of the ponies and identify any foals born after the July auction. The fall roundup is typically where the fire company will sell any foals that were born after the pony swim. We had originally planned to buy a foal during the fall roundup, but as we all know, sometimes life throws in a twist.

The Chincoteague Fire Department Pony Swim

Chincoteague Ponies are known worldwide because of Marguerite Henry’s book, Misty of Chincoteague. The book tells the story of siblings Paul and Maureen Beebe and their quest to purchase an elusive mare during the next Pony Penning on Chincoteague Island in Virginia. What most people do not know is that Misty was a real pony. 
The Chincoteague Fire Department Pony Swim is an annual event that draws tens of thousands of spectators to the tiny island of Chincoteague. The event is held the last consecutive Wednesday and Thursday in July. The ponies living on the Virginia side of Assateague Island are rounded up by the Saltwater Cowboys and held in large paddocks on the south end of the island. The Pony Swim happens on Wednesday during slack tide, a short window of time – roughly fifteen minutes – when there is no movement of water in the tidal stream. Once slack tide arrives, the ponies begin the swim across the pony swim lane from Assateague Island to Chincoteague Island.
Thursday is the big day – the auction. The auction serves two purposes for the fire company: the first is that it helps control the pony population on Assateague, and the second is that it raises money for the fire department. Foals old enough to leave their mothers are auctioned off to their new homes, and those who aren’t old enough yet will stay at the carnival grounds with their mothers until they are old enough to leave in the fall. The pony committee will carefully select a handful of foals that will return to the island to live out their lives as feral ponies. Even though these ponies will be returning to Assateague, they still go through the auction and often get some of the highest bids. The highest bidders for these “buyback” ponies get to choose a name for the foal that will go on to maintain the population on the island.