On the eve of the inaugural online sale that would introduce the greater equine market to their heritage horse program and their brand, Bois D’Arc Bleu, Tierney Perkins was suddenly widowed. Now, in memory of her beloved husband, Kolt, and out of devotion to their two young sons, Tierney is preserving the legacy he was building, horse program and all, one day and one horse at a time.

One year ago, Tierney Perkins was closing the gate to the horse pasture on her Clarksville, Texas, ranch when a violent wind blew in, snatching her long, dark hair off her shoulders and lashing it northward. She shielded her face from the suddenly stinging sands and made her way to the house to check the weather as a tremendous rain released from the sky. 

It was all over in a few minutes, but Tierney sounded the alarm in a text to her husband, Kolt, who was taking a rare break from the ranch to enjoy the lake with his father-in-law and his sons, Bleu, 13, and Burr, 2.

“A storm is coming,” she warned.

To know Kolt Perkins

When, at 15, Florida girl Tierney Willis first laid eyes on 17-year-old, born-and-bred Texas rancher Kolt Perkins, she didn’t stand a chance. But neither did anyone else.

“To know him was to love him,” Tierney said. “People always gravitated to Kolt…. He was just enough rough around the edges that people immediately let their guards down and started laughing with him. He cusses real bad, but he’s big and sweet. He’s this huge guy that could be really scary, but he’s just a big teddy bear, and people just melted to him.”

Horses, it seemed, were equally prone to meld to Kolt’s ways—a skill that served the multi-generational Perkins Ranch well as he honed the 200-head ranch herd into a solid and sought-after breeding program. In fact, as trusted as Kolt had become regionally for providing well-minded stock to horsemen and ropers with all manner of needs across all degrees of ability, Kolt—in an evolutionary process of moving from tried-and-true cowboy ways to finding opportunity with modern-day technologies—asked his wife and partner to help him grow.

Expecting a cowboy to change said ways can be a fool’s errand, but Kolt and Tierney’s first son, Bleu, had them trained up well when it came to thinking outside the box.

“We have a 2-year-old and a 13-year-old, and our 13-year-old is autistic,” Tierney said. “And, it’s been quite the journey, having a child on the spectrum. We kind of panicked when he was 3 and found out; we had no idea what to do.”

At their core, the Perkins are ranchers. They run a Red Angus cow-calf operation which is the foundation of their horse program: all work is done ahorseback, and the horses that come through the program have done all manner of ranch jobs in all kinds of weather across all types of terrain. The work, however, is the only constant. A day in the life of a cattle rancher is never the same as the last—an appealing aspect for most, but a devastating reality for first-time parents raising a special needs child who requires a structured schedule.

“One of the things they told us that he would need for maximum support was a finite schedule,” Tierney said, recalling the trips they took to Dallas, two hours from the ranch, for specialized therapies two days a week. “Our stomachs dropped when they told us that because every day looks different on a ranch. The weather, the circumstances, hour by hour, we could not provide that sort of structure for him, and we felt like these huge failures.”

In the face of information like the divorce rate catapulting to 80% for couples raising a child with special needs, Kolt and Tierney asked themselves all the hard questions and ultimately decided that moving off the ranch wasn’t an option, so they were going to have to forge their own way with what they had.

“We had no idea where to start,” Tierney said, the exasperation she must have felt in those early days returning to her voice. “But Kolt immediately said, ‘We’re not going to be slaves to this thing. He’ll be fine. The way we live is the best life for him, and we will figure this out.’”

Eventually, weekly trips to Dallas were altered into having professionals come to the ranch to teach Bleu and Kolt and Tierney in their own environments and, the more they learned, the more they grew.

“When he was little, Bleu loved numbers and letters,” Tierney said. “He still does, but he was just obsessed with them and particular fonts, and he liked things to be [in order of] the color spectrum: red, orange, yellow, green. So Kolt said, ‘I need you to print out the alphabet for me in his favorite fonts and in the color scheme he likes. I’m going to hide them all over the ranch.’”

In a culture that can’t get enough of little boys following in the footsteps of their daddies, Kolt had a son who would not be charmed by romantic notions of ranch life.

“Bleu would have much preferred learning French or Armenian to working 300 head of cattle,” Tierney said. “He loves fine dining over Vienna sausages in the feed truck. Kolt’s cattle call was a huge sensory issue. It would leave Bleu on the floorboard of the feed truck with his hands over his ears trying to drown out the sound.”

Against all odds, though, through pure devotion and a little ingenuity, Kolt inspired Bleu to want to cowboy with his father. 

“He would get Bleu out riding his horse for hours, checking cattle, working, and Bleu just thinks he’s on a scavenger hunt for letters the whole time,” Tierney revealed. “He thought it was so much fun. Bleu also loves swings—they help him regulate if he gets stressed out about something—so Kolt kept a swing in his truck that he could mount wherever they were. He mounted it at the corrals; he mounted it on the forks of the tractor. 

“And he loves water, so, if there was a water hole to stop at, Kolt made sure Bleu was able to stop and take a break to swim.”

A day at the lake

A few years ago, Tierney’s dad, Mike, retired and moved from Florida to Texas. With him, he brought his boat and his love for the water, and for the first time in his land-locked, East Texas life, Kolt found himself discovering his own penchant for days at the lake. Plus, he loved spending time on the water with his sons.

“He really started embracing going to the lake and taking off when it was too hot to work and taking the boys for a couple of hours,” Tierney said. “He started going more than I did, and I was like, ‘Who are you turning into?!’”

Both in their early 40s, Tierney and Kolt started to recognize the value in taking breaks from the day-to-day when they could and not letting life pass them by quite so quickly. As the temperature started climbing over the 2023 Labor Day weekend—it would hit 104 degrees in Clarksville that week—Kolt called on his father-in-law and packed up the kids.

Within the hour, both boys were suited up with life jackets, sitting side by side on a towable float and laughing with each cool spray from the boat’s wake. Mike was skillfully captaining the vessel through the busy holiday waters while Kolt kept an eagle eye on the boys. The sun was warm on their bare shoulders, and the wind in their hair was a welcome respite from their sweaty hat bands.

When the youngest, Burr Lewis, fell off the tube and into the water, Mike arced the boat around. Bleu came off, too, so Kolt jumped in the water to help Burr and instructed his father-in-law to pick up Bleu. 

On the dash of the boat, Kolt’s phone pinged.

First loves

After college, Tierney did a work abroad program with PBR Australia and, upon arriving stateside again, she visited Texas to meet a nephew who had been born in her absence. 

“I stayed in Texas for a month and ended up reconnecting with Kolt,” Tierney said of seeing the boy she’d met and moved on from so many years ago. “Here we are, almost 30, and it was like nothing had ever changed. It took literally 24 hours to fall madly in love with him. He’s always been my feral first love that you never really get over.”

Stars crossed and fates were sealed, and the young couple was diving headfirst into forever when Tierney, who’d grown up roping but wanted to pursue a career in rodeo’s live events, learned she’d landed her dream job with the PBR at their headquarters in Colorado.

Tierney spent a year working with the organization and gaining valuable marketing experience, all the while traveling back and forth to Texas to plan her October 2009 wedding to Kolt. Then, she became a ranch wife.

“There are so many funny stories of me getting into my rancher wife era,” Tierney added, smiling. “We had a lot of good laughs about it, but we were so in love and such good partners, it just felt awkward for me to be dependent. I wanted just a little project of my own, so I started an online boutique.”

Tierney speaks of the venture humbly, but most women with Western leanings will probably remember the very successful and very avant-garde Wild Bleu boutique that emerged circa 2011 to the great delight of cowgirl fashionistas everywhere. In an interview about the venture conducted by The Boutique Hub, Tierney flexes her professional wit and wisdom in a way that suggests to the reader she’s authentically accomplished with a healthy side of everyday woman trying to find the balance.

Back at the ranch, though, the balance eluded her. Kolt made a proposal.

Bois D’Arc Bleu

“I did that probably for seven years, but it was supposed to be a little project,” Tierney said of Wild Bleu. “I have no stop in me whatsoever once I get going with something, so I just kept letting it grow and grow. All the sudden there were employees, and I was working just as much as Kolt. 

“He was like, ‘I’m really proud of you, but it’s kind of all hands on deck at the ranch, and I need you here. What if you can do what you do for me?’”

And so began Bois D’Arc Bleu under the umbrella of which Tierney would sell their Ranch 2 Table beef, run an online mercantile and introduce the world to the horses Kolt made and marked with the Sproutin’ P brand—the combination of Kolt’s parents’ LP brand and Tierney’s great-grandmother’s Fleur de Lou that she received from her grandmother as a graduation gift. Kolt’s mom, Vicki Perkins, gave the couple the blended brand as their wedding gift.

It is not uncommon to see the brand at work in roping arenas big and small.  

“I bought my first horse 21 years ago, and I’ve had six of them since,” Duane Livingston said in an interview about Kolt’s horses for Bois D’Arc Bleu. “I’ve got three now. They’re good horses. One of them, I’ve let my grandson have. He’s made a top roping horse out of him, and he’s qualified to go to the team roping in Las Vegas on him.”

Recently, eight-time NFR qualifier Coleman Proctor became the proud owner of “Charlie Daniels,” a Sproutin’ P branded horse he purchased from two-time BFI Week winner Hannah White and her husband, PBR Hall of Famer turned team roper Mike White.

Kolt’s Sproutin’ P branded horses were ranch-raised and good-minded. They knew where their feet were by the time they went to work, and they went to work under the same man who taught his autistic son to sort cattle by pasting his favorite letters on the cows.

“That’s one thing about Kolt,” said his father, Aaron Perkins, in a video filmed for the website. “He’s got the patience of Job, now. And that’s the one thing it takes to make a good horse.”

With proven horses and a revered reputation, Kolt and Tierney geared up for their first online horse sale, a venture that was greatly inspired by Melanie Smith at Solo Select Horses.

“I showed him Melanie as a testament,” Tierney explained. “People are going to adapt to online sales, and there’s a way to do it to make them feel comfortable. She was such a selling point for me to prove to him that there’s a space for the horse industry to move forward and for me to market him in a way that was genuine to his program and how he did everything.”

Tierney started putting Kolt on camera—a position that did not come naturally to the humble horseman.

“I really had to convince him,” Tierney remembered, telling Kolt, “‘You are the source. You are what we do here, and how we do it is something people are going to be really receptive to. None of this is going to be a problem, but I need you to get comfortable in front of the camera, talking.’

“And he was so adorable,” she remembered. “We would practice on video, and it was just the cutest thing because he was not used to it.”

But Kolt cowboyed up, Tierney launched a stunning website illustrating the legacy and love behind their brand and, together, they set the date for the inaugural Bois D’Arc Bleu online sale: Sept. 24, 2023. 

Storm’s coming

“A storm is coming,” buzzed the warning on Kolt’s phone as he jumped in the water and sent the boat away to gather up Bleu.

“What happened at that point, my dad was trying to get our older son back in the boat, but he was having trouble,” Tierney recounted. “So my dad jumped in … and that wind came up and blew the boat away from them.”

A heavy chop developed on the lake making the four bobbing heads invisible to other boaters as white caps crashed against their small watercraft that they turned into the gale to stay afloat in the downpour. When the winds calmed after those brief but horrible minutes, fellow boaters found and retrieved Mike and Bleu. Under Mike’s direction, they returned to where Kolt had swam to the baby.

Burr Lewis was floating in his life jacket, alive. Kolt was gone.

Rising in the D’Arc

With the entire operation already set to launch only three weeks later, the inaugural horse sale was offered as planned, but the year has been one of extreme heartbreak for Tierney. And with it, extreme devotion.

“I think it’s important for my boys to see me get up every morning and put my boots on and go take care of something that’s bigger than me,” said the woman who has committed herself to learning how to stand where Kolt stood. “I mean, if it were just me, I would curl up in the fetal position and happily die of a broken heart to go be with him. But I have to wait patiently and raise these animals, raise these boys, and I have a job left to do in his honor and in his legacy.”

With Kolt’s horse program being such an integral part of that legacy, Tierney made big moves on a stud that checked all of Kolt’s boxes.

“One of our big goals was to buy a new stallion,” Tierney said. “[Kolt] wanted a homozygous roan, and Once In A Blu Boon was one of the bloodlines he was interested in, so I bought ‘Rudy’—Boons Reflections—from Melanie in her November sale last year. He’s exactly what we were looking for.”

The 14.3 hand, 2018 stud has a cutting background to the tune of $72,520 LTE and, after some time training under the NCHA’s No. 1 leading Open rider, Adan Banuelos, is standing at the Brightstone Ranch in Valley View, Texas. Rudy, according to his website, is “owned by Bleu and Burr Perkins in legacy of their Daddy, Kolt Perkins.”

Living a legacy: the new Kolt Perkins Ranch brand

In grief’s timeless tale, what comes after a loss is as harsh and unpredictable as the untimely and tragic loss itself. But even in the wake of the past year’s astounding heartaches, Tierney is staying focused on the goals and the momentum Kolt had put toward their boys and the future he was building for his family through Bois D’Arc Bleu.

This November, Women’s Rodeo World Championship Commissioner Lindsay Rosser-Sumpter will be debuting Rudy’s roping talents at the Gold Buckle Futurities Fall Roping. Coming off his cutting training and going into his 6-year-old year, Sumpter anticipates Rudy bringing his best to the arena.

“You have to teach [cutters, sometimes] how to get behind the cow because they’re so used to getting in front of cattle and getting them stopped,” Sumpter said, explaining what she’s learned transitioning cutters into rope horses in the past, including the horse she’s currently competing on. “But that’s really the only challenge a lot of times. They kind of get to where they like it, and they almost want to beat the cow. And so you have to just remind them that they have to stay behind the cow.”

Sumpter, the recently retired head coach for Otero College Rodeo and a Roping.com coach, too, became friends with Tierney in her PBR years. They’ve long planned to partner up, but life and kids and rodeo and loss seemed to stand in the way. 

“My goal as her friend is to do the best that I can to support this dream that she has,” said Sumpter, who also has mares on Rudy’s books. “All I have is my ability with a rope and a with a horse, and hopefully we can make the dream a reality.”

Moving forward, Tierney will offer beef, clothing and horses under the new Kolt Perkins Ranch by Bois D’Arc Bleu. The horse crop won’t be out of the ranch’s broodmares, but they will be ranch-raised, and they will possess the work ethic, structure and athleticism Kolt was always aiming for. To make sure of it, Tierney made another investment in April when she purchased a Solo Select embryo by The Darkk Side out of SS Blacks Little Kitty, due to hit the ground in 2025.

“A strong bone and big foot meant a lot to him,” Tierney said of Kolt’s preferences in an interview after the sale. “He loved something a hard-working cowboy didn’t have to baby. A strong bone and big foot meant a lot to him. I know he would really like The Darkk Side.… Lord knows I wish Kolt were here for me to ask his opinion every step of the way, but I know he’d be super excited about this embryo.”

Even more recently, Tierney purchased a 2024 own daughter of Shining Spark and out of Sky Blu.

“Sky Blu is a daughter of Mecom Blue,” Tierney explained, “and Mecom Blue and Shining Spark were two of the bloodlines that we used in our stallions. In fact, the majority of our marriage, our main stallion was an own son of Shining Spark, and he was Kolt’s favorite.

“So, having an own daughter, now, is just something I’m over the moon about. I really wasn’t planning on finding an own of Shining Spark, but the opportunity came up and I really have just had such peace this last week because I feel like I’ve really secured the main bloodlines we were wanting. I’m just really grateful for the opportunities that I’ve had to buy great horses and start building back.”

A horseman becomes a hero

The science of drowning is well studied and documented. Almost always, a person in danger of drowning will lose the ability to rationalize his actions and he will, without regard for consequence, save himself if given the chance. But Kolt was no ordinary person. And he was an extraordinary father.

When rescue crews recovered Kolt’s body from the lake some 24 hours later, a truth was realized: Kolt’s final, earthly act of love for his son was his ability to let Burr float atop the water in his lifejacket as Kolt himself succumbed to drowning. He did not reach out. He did not, despite the persistent neurologic compulsion to do so, save himself. Instead, he saved his son.

“From what I’ve learned about people that drown, you should never get close to them,” Tierney said. “They panic, and they’ll hold onto anything.… It tells you everything you need to know about him.”

Standing in the gap

It’s been a whole year since friends, family and neighbors searched the dark waters for Kolt Perkins. A whole year of Tierney navigating days that were designed to be met with her partner at her side. A year of deciding what would become of Bois D’Arc Bleu.

Bois D’Arc is the name of a native tree species in the region. Its wood is hard and durable and, therefore, a natural choice for fences. The Osage fashioned bows from it and, during the Dust Bowl of the 1930s, it was constructed into the form of countless windbreaks. On the ranch, Kolt fancied himself a bit of an artist, building entryways that arc sturdily across the gaps in the fence. 

And that is where you’ll find Tierney: Standing in the gap, with Kolt above.

“I’m just doing my best to live his legacy for our boys and stand in the gap and make sure their life on the ranch looks as close to what their dad built for them,” Tierney said. “And those are some really big boots to fill, but it’s my honor to do that and to hold that space for him.”

Chances are good there’s a lot Kolt would be excited about were he to witness what Tierney has taken on: A program founded on what he cherished most in a horse, of course, but also watching his wife realize her own strengths and abilities. 

 “Things that you don’t think about or appreciate, like, I am really grateful for good mama cows this year,” Tierney said of having to only pull one calf in her first solo calving season. “They made my job easy, and they took care of their babies, so I was really grateful.”

Bringing the Kolt Perkins Ranch horses to market will also require many firsts for Tierney, but it’s perhaps the thing she’s never been more sure of.

“This horse thing has really been a way for me to feel close to him and to feel his presence,” Tierney said. “That’s when I feel closest to him, is being around those horses or riding through the cattle. And I know that’s where my children will find him.”

—TRJ—