A Breed Apart
by Brett Buckner
Since she was old enough to walk,
Kinsey Harris Rolling
has been riding horses, but her job on an Alabama quail
hunting preserve makes Rolling
rather unique.
LOCATED OFF A LONELY STRETCH OF HIGHWAY 26 some
seven miles outside of Hurtsboro, High Log Creek
Hunting Preserve is a place where beauty belongs.
Like a lit torch tossed into the once placid green of
the forest, autumn leaves burn brightly as the cool
November winds blow up a storm of color far as the eye can see.
Even amid such natural beauty, Kinsey Harris Rolling stands
out. Her long blond hair and welcoming smile contrast mightily
with her surroundings as she walks expertly among horses
that react to her presence with both love and respect. But the
23-year-old Columbus State University senior stands out in
other, less obvious, ways.
“I’m probably the only girl who works on a quail hunting
plantation in the South,” she says with a proud laugh. “And I
love it.”
Three years ago, Rex Clark, owner of High Log Creek,
walked into a Columbus John Deere dealership and mentioned
he was looking to hire someone to train and ride horses for hunts
on his quail hunting preserve, which doesn’t use motor vehicles,
only horses and mule-drawn carts. The girl behind the counter,
who happened to be friend of Rolling’s, had only one question: “Does it matter if it’s a girl?”
Rex Clark isn’t one to mince words or waste time. Located inan area known for its quail hunting, “and it’s been that way for a
hundred years,” Clark says, High Log Creek offers its customers
the best in everything — from hunting dogs and horses to the
Southern feasts prepared at the nearby plantation house.
“It’s not normal,” Clark says of having a woman working at a
hunting preserve, “but they aren’t surprised. As long as we get the
job done, they don’t care. And Kinsey gets the job done. She’s a
damn good kid, and I’m proud to have her.”
As part of the job interview, Rolling was asked to pick a horse
to ride. Without waiting for assistance, Rolling guided a horse out
of the barn and saddled it up.
“I was the first person who came to the job knowing how to
saddle a horse,” Rolling says, sitting on a plastic stoop as Pete,
Clark’s favorite horse, looks hungrily over her shoulder. “I don’t
think that reliable help is hard to find out here. It’s quality help.”
In Rolling, a Phenix City native, Clark found both. She trains
the 60-plus horses on the preserve — all of which are Tennessee
walking horses because they’re rarely high strung and give a
smooth ride. In addition to the hunting parties, Clark also buys
and sells horses, making it Rolling’s job to “break” new colts so
they are safe for casual riders. She’s also in charge of feeding and
watering as well as checking the fences for breaks.
Most of the hunters who come to High Log Creek have little
riding experience, so it’s Rolling’s responsibility to match a horse
with the right rider.
“Like a person, you can tell a lot about a horse by looking in
their eyes,” she says. If they’re wide-eyed and look scared—watch
out. So I never let anybody ride a horse until I know how they’ll
react on a hunt.
“Customers are paying a lot for a good experience. If you put
them on a horse that makes them miserable, they’re not going to
remember how many birds they killed, how good the food or the
company was. All they’re going to remember was how hard a time they had getting the horse to do
what it’s supposed to do.”
Most of the men think nothing of having
a woman teach them how to ride,
although some won’t willingly admit they
don’t know how. But there are a few who
can’t help but ask the obvious question.
“I don’t have to put guys in their
place,” she says, grinning. “Sometimes
they’re surprised, and a few guys have
tried to pick me up, but mostly they just
want to know why I’m here.”
It’s not for the quail hunting. Though
she’s aspiring to lead hunting trips and is “amazed” by the natural instincts of
Clark’s hunting dogs, Rolling’s not all
that interested in killing anything.
“That’s just not my gig,” she says. “I
figure if I won’t eat it, then I shouldn’t kill
it. I don’t eat deer meat and I don’t eat
quail, so I don’t shoot deer and I don’t
shoot quail.
“Plus, managing 60 horses … that
pretty much takes up all my time.”
Clark leads quail hunts on the preserve — the exact size of which he keeps under
wraps, saying only that it’s “big … real big”
— seven days a week, 140 days straight,
save for New Year’s and Christmas. During the off season, is when Rolling does most
of the training, choosing five or so horses
to work with at a time.
“The most challenging thing for me is
to know when the horses are ready for a
person who can’t ride to get on them,”
she says. “I can get on a horse and make it
do what it’s supposed to without thinking
much about it. And for the horse, it’s hard
to get comfortable with someone who’s
not comfortable with them.
“It takes time, a lot of time to know
when they’re ready.”
Rolling’s been riding horses since she
was 2 years old. The passion and skill for
horses was handed down from her grandfather,
Winston Richards, who showed
walking horses for years.
“He put us on horses before we were
potty trained,” Rolling says. “It’s pretty
much all I’ve ever known.”
And it’s all her mother, Pam Harris, can
remember her doing. In fact, Harris can’t
remember a time when her daughter
wasn’t riding horses. Even when she was a
teenager, a time when most girls are giving
up the hobby in favor of cars and dating,
Rolling’s love of riding only grew stronger.
“At a time when most parents are begging
for the chance to spend time with
their kids, we were spending every Saturday
at the horse show,” Harris says. “She’s
just a natural. She respects the horses, and
there’s nothing they won’t do for her.”
Rolling is what her mother calls a “quiet observer.” She studies the horses
that she’s training, learns their mannerism,
understands their temperaments and,
with a practiced patience, knows how to
teach them to follow her commands as if
it were their own.
“She doesn’t say a lot, but she’s always
watching,” Harris says. “There’s a lot
going on in that head.”
One of those thoughts might very well
be some words of wisdom that Harris once
shared with her daughter. The secret to
happiness is finding what you love to do
and getting paid for it. For Rolling, that
means training horses at High Log Creek.
“I just don’t see myself sitting at a desk
for eight hours a day in an office where I
can’t wear my boots and jeans,” she says. “I
can’t imagine doing anything else. This is
all I want to do and where I want to be."
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