Back in 1981, we acquired our first half-Arabian and began breeding Arabians the next year. That first horse "Princess" is a palomino mare who, at age 31, is still on the farm with us, enjoying the pasture in her retirement and acting as babysitter when foals are weaned.

Today, we keep about fifteen Arabians at LoCo Meadows, our farm in the heart of the Susquehanna Valley of central Pennsylvania. While some folks assume the farm name was derived from the fact that "things get a little crazy here sometimes," in reality the name came from our first names -- Lonny and Connie.

We're a small, family owned operation. We strive for one to five homebreds per year. Why not more? We've kept it small because we don't ever want to put more foals on the ground than we can handle ourselves. When foals are born, one of us always wants to be there, to be sure everything is taken care of properly. We don't just throw them out in the field -- we care for them and handle them every day from the very start.

Our's goal is to produce athletic, quiet, reasonable -- and pretty -- horses. Our daughter was involved in 4-H while she was growing up, and we came to appreciate the sorts of horses whose attitudes are suited for that sort of work. So at LoCo Meadows, the goal is to produce Arabs the way the old Arab horse used to be -- level-headed and quiet, not hyper, high-strung, jump-at-everything horses. Hot-headed halter horses are gorgeous to watch, but that's not what our clientele wants. Instead, we market our Arabs to amateur riders and family horse owners. Most of our babies have been owned and trained by the average person. And when we purchase breeding stock, we consider the animal's attitude its most important feature, not just its bloodlines!

That said, the Arabians we produce are still terrific horses for showing. Several have been trained by Omni Arabians (Oxford, Pennsylvania) as hunter or western pleasure prospects; in 2002, one of those has cleaned up for his junior owner throughout Region 16! Others have been shown in 4-H -- in fact, two recently were named state champions in Pennsylvania! While they might not have the zing to do park or English pleasure -- they're pretty mellow -- we really feel safer with what we're producing: Horses that want to please and can be handled by kids.

Click here to see some of the babies we've produced over the years, including several of those who've been successful in the show ring.