We are located in the heart of the Interlake of Manitoba, in Malonton/Fraserwood, Manitoba. In Armstrong Municipality.
We’ve been at this location for 21 years and prior to that we were a family known as Dusty Trails in Winnipeg Beach for over 20 years.
Currently the ranch boasts over 180 acres of forests, meadows, creeks and a scenic prairie landscape that offers a nice variety of nature to explore out on the trails on the back of a horse.
Having operated our extremely popular trail rides program for over 35 years, we have decided to instead focus on giving lessons to students interested in furthering their horsemanship abilities, our trail rides are now simply a pleasure and a welcome mental stimulus for our horses and boarders of varying riding skills to enjoy.
Our trails are not open to the public.
It should be noted that several encounters with wildlife should be certainly be expected. There are ranch amenities like our playground on site, fully serviced washrooms, heated tack room, indoor 50'round pen, outdoor 100x200’ sand arena, stalls available and security features installed.
The ranch is designed to be very family-friendly with a laid back atmosphere, with friendly and very knowledgable wranglers, apprentices and owners. We operated our popular summer camp program for 9 years offering overnight sleep-away camp for girls aged 10-17 and our Cowboy Camp for the littles aged 5-10 for many fun-filled years. These incredibly valuable experiences offered us so many equestrian relationships that we still maintain to this day with our campers. So many of “our young ladies” have grown up to become horse specialists themselves in the training, showing, horse-owning, farriering and even becoming veterinary professionals. What a wonderful thing to experience!
Amber and Tara both grew up in St.Andrews on a hobby farm with a wide variety of both ponies and horses of all different kinds. Our parents were able to provide us with riding lessons and horsemanship experiences from our toddler years and we were lucky enough to participate in local horse shows, parades, clubs etc.. We learned from an early start how to provide essential care to client own horses and well as our own. As young entrepeneurials, Amber started Dusty Trails with our brother as a very young adult offering trail rides to the general public, starting a herd on their own from scratch, developing boarding and lessons programs and training a wide variety of horses for various purposes. We have guided hundreds of trail rides over 40 years, operated our overnight summer camps and day camps for 10 years, packed out in the mountains and prairie landscapes for many years and we have encountered so many experiences in our adventures together creating a strong read in our riders and our horses with their combined abilities. These decades of instructing, herd management and guiding experience, have made both Amber and Tara valuable instructors and horsewomen.
The People of the Ranch :
Tara Tyndale is the Ranch Manager alongside with her husband David. After completing his 26 year carreer with The City Of Winnipeg, David is now a constant presence in our community as an active counsellor in our municipality, constantly learning and contributing to our agricultural and ranching .
We are the ones to speak with regarding boarding and ranch day to day maintenance. As the on-site owners, we are out there every day with the horses, monitoring their well-being, feeding, and checking to see that everything is ship shape in their habitat.
Tara is Certified through CHA and is qualified in Western (Level3), English Flat (Level 2) and Overnight Trail Guide (Level2).
We are very pleased to have been able to provide co-instruction from several of our amazing apprentices over our many years to our clients and take great pride that these young women got their start in horsemanship with us continuing to develop their horsemanship skills well into their adult years. Our instructors are always very capable, knowledgeable, caring horsewomen who have taught countless riders, to ride, show and care for our beautiful equine partners. We are proud of these horsewomen and wranglers who have proven their love and passion for everything horses. They’ve grown to take on their own horse ranches, horse ownership, training, showing and teaching.
This year we are blessed to once again have returning alumni back to offer their instruction and guidance and we know they bring with them excellent quality horsemanship. We love watching you do what you do with your horses!
Recently Certified CHA Instructor Brooklyn Senga (Capuska)
We are very pleased to have Brooklyn join us as a qualified Instructor.
Information on her lesson schedule and horse development program can be found on her website : Rockfieldranch.com We look forward to her lessons here as she brings her passion, enthusiasm and professionalism with both horses and clients alike to our barn.
For those looking for miles on their horses :
We are able to currently offer Halter Training, young horse starting and conditioning services.
More details may be discussed in person or over the phone.
