Forest Flower, champion 2-year-old filly in England of 1986 and a champion in Ireland the following year, was euthanized Feb. 10 at Betty Moran’s Brushwood Farm in Pennsylvania. The 27-year-old mare had been pensioned in 2002.
Forest Flower won four of six starts at 2, winning the Rokeby Farms Mill Reef Stakes (Eng-II), Queen Mary Stakes (Eng-III), and Pritchard Services Cherry Hinton Stakes (Eng-III) on her way to being named champion juvenile filly. She placed in the Heinz 57 Phoenix Stakes (Ire-I).
The following year she made only two starts, landing the classic Goffs Irish One Thousand Guineas (Ire-I). That effort earned her championship honors as the highweighted 3-year-old filly on the 1987 Irish Free Handicap at 7-9 1/2 furlongs.
In all she won five of eight starts and earned $133,293.
A daughter of Green Forestout of the Nijinsky IImare Leap Lively, Forest Flower was a half sister to Scoop the Gold, the stakes-winning dam of multiple grade I winner High Yield.
As a broodmare, all nine of her foals were starters with seven winners. Her first foal, Hill of Dreams, was stakes-placed in Belgium. Brushwood acquired Forest Flower for $671,000 in 1992.
Forest Flower is to be buried in the memorial garden at Bryn Clovis along with other Brushwood stars Crème Fraiche, La Affirmed, I'm Sweets, and Flowing.
