Photo of the Day: Bint Muhaira, ‘Ubayyah, USA

Yesterday, I posted the photo of the beautful Bint Turfara (Sirecho x Turfara by Fadl). Below is the photo of another foundation mare of the BLUE STAR program, her 1961 half sister Bint Muhaira (Sirecho x *Muhaira by Old Hamdani), a ‘Ubayyah. She was bred by the Searle Stud.

Her dam *Muhaira (Old Hamdani x *Mahraa) was bred in Saudi Arabia, by an expat lady, Esther Ames, from two horses from the stud of Prince Sa’ud ibn ‘Abd Allah Ibn Jalawi, Governor of the oil rich province of al-Hasa in Saudi Arabia. *Muhaira and her dam *Mahraa were imported to the USA by Mrs. Ames. *Muhaira’s sire, the Old Hamdani (born around 1938), was presented by Ibn Jalawi to Mr. Thomas C. Barger, then CEO of the Arabian American Oil Company (ARAMCO, the state-owned national oil company of Saudi Arabia, renamed Saudi Aramco in 1988). Old Hamdani was apparently also imported to the USA, but he was never registered in this country. He was featured on this blog early on, here.

As an aside: The stud of Prince Saud Ibn Jalawi (alternative spelling: Jiluwi) was really part of the group of studs of the House of Saud, not only because of the frequent exchanges of horses, but especially because the Ibn Jalawi clan is a really a branch of the larger House of Saud. The original Jalawi ibn Turki was none else than the brother of Faysal ibn Turki al-Imam, who is the grandfather of King Abdul Aziz ibn Saud, the founder of the modern Saudi dynasty. Ibn Jalawi’s stud was famous for two strains ‘Ubayyan and Hamdani.  While no ‘substrain’ is acribed the Ibn Jalawi horses of these two strains that were imported to the USA, it is highly likely that these were ‘Ubayyan Sharrak and Hamdani Simri.

7 Replies to “Photo of the Day: Bint Muhaira, ‘Ubayyah, USA

  1. FYI–As of yesterday I am now the owner of SS Morwen, a 19 year old black mare tail female to Mahraa through Bint Muhaira. She is with my stallion Turfas Marine for better or worse. They seem “very taken” with one another. We’ll see what we end up with. Please wish me luck!

  2. Your mare is special Janet in that she is one of the very few to have a line to *Muhaira outside the BLUE STAR group.

    Within the BLUE STAR group, the precious bloodline of Muhaira is only bred with a limited number of horses: Turfa, Fadl, Sirecho, Al Hamdaniah and, to a lesser extent a few more desert bred horses from Saudi Arabia.

    Your mare is significant in this regard because it allows you (and us) to see what the Muhaira line could produce when bred to other lines (like the Babson lines) than the ones i refer to above.

  3. This is wonderful news!! I seem to be having dumb beginners luck (or fate) with these horses. Maybe this is the upside to the recession. I would have never been able to afford horses like this before. Maybe myself and others who have the interest but not the money will be able to contribute at least somewhat to the preservation efforts. We’ll see what happens. My stallion is a very happy camper!!

  4. There are so FEW of these horses left! Good luck with this match!

    I finally have a couple of photos of the stallion we acquired last year from Wayne Pilley (the group of MAHRAA / MUHAIRA descendents who had never been registered). They are not great pictures because he is behind a wire fence, but you can get the idea… he is a quality horse.

    I will try to atach one to an email to you Edouard.

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