Bar T Quarter Horses
Haslet, Texas
bartquarterhorses.com
817-851-2870
Jamey Thompkins’ road to owning and running Bar T Quarter Horses, and becoming an AQHA Ranching Heritage Breeder, was not a straight and foregone path. His work in the oil and gas industry led him from his home in Texas to California for a number of years.
“I fell and hit my head on a rock and decided to buy a horse,” Thompkins joked. “Forty-seven of them later, here we are.”
Thompkins spent 17 years on the rodeo trail as a steer wrestler and spent time around great breeders before going to work in the oil and gas industry. He lived in California for several years, where he bought the Doc O’Lena-bred foundation mares for Bar T.
Although always interested in raising horses and cattle, Thompkins claims it was his daughter Faith’s push that got him to consider making it his business.
“It was on a fling from my daughter to have a mare and foal,” he said.
The Bar T genetics rely heavily on Sugar Bars and Colonel Freckles. Thompkins notes that he has scouted and bought as many daughters of CJ Sugar as he could.
“I’ve always loved Sugar Bars, that’s why we keep them around,” he said. Although he spent years wrestling steers, today his interest leans more toward roping them. “The roping end, that’s our passion now, but we still show, too.”
Horses raised on the Bar T are used on the ranch’s cattle operation as well as in the arena. Thompkins employs a team of trainers to help out and now raises around 13 foals a year. In the past, the Bar T has hosted an annual production sale, offering weanlings and 2-year-olds, but with the proliferation of rope-horse-centric breeding incentives, futurities and sales, Thompkins is considering a change.
“We’re selling a lot by private treaty and we’ve got a couple headed to the Royal Crown sale in Arizona,” he said.
The Bar T also has stallions enrolled in the biggest incentives (the Royal Crown and the Riata Buckle) including Double Shot of Sugar, Bar T Dry Pine and Bar T Dry Sugar. The latter, the Bar T’s junior sire nicknamed Mo, is out of one of their foundation mares, Piney Sug, who passed away at the age of 28.
“We sure like riding them,” he said. “If we don’t sell them, we ride them.”
