The Ranch
Josiane Gauthier Performance Horses operates on the beautiful Family owned Ranch in Lucama NC. "Sunny Pines Farm" was founded by Josiane’s father in 1993. This ranch was originally the home of legendary Cutter Dick Pieper. When he relocated to Texas, the opportunity presented itself and Francois moved his training facility from Quebec Canada to North Carolina. Undergone quite a few transformations over the past 25 years, the ranch offers an enormous training and breeding program. Josiane moved to North Carolina in 2000 to join the family business and learn all aspects of the reining horse industry.
As a young women, Josiane focused on running her dad’s breeding operation. Through the years, she managed the ranch and over 200 to 250 horses during peak season. The breeding program was well rounded, standing 5 to 8 stallions per season, breeding 100 to 150 mares including shipping cool semen, frozen, embryo transfer, AI. Josiane managed 60 to 80 foalings per season and was responsible of the health and care of the herd.
During this very busy time, she kept her non pro status showing her father's horses, and helped training and preparing sale horses . She was very competitive and loved aged event. She learned a lot with showing all type of horses and was able to expand her skill from showing in the youth to L4 non pro futurity and derby events. Through her career as a non pro she earned over 350,000 and multiple major events. Managing a large training and breeding operation, from health to office work, from nutrition on all age of horses to getting 100 mares in foal per year, Josiane learned to perform under high demands and stress and learn a lot of very valuable lesson along the way. All this experience set her up to be the horse trainer and business owner she wanted to become. In 2012 Josiane gave up her non pro status which lead to her career as an NRHA and AQHA professional. Being a trainer was always her dream, and she is so thankful for her father's guidance and the opportunity and life lessons she learned along the way.
