HCF Staff and Family
Marylaura Doherty, our proprietor, was born in 1966 in College Station while her dad, Tom Bradfield, attended veterinary school at Texas A&M and her mother, Kathy Bradfield, taught first grade. Her aunt and uncle were both veterinarians. Her family moved to Westlake Hills in 1968 and opened Westlake Animal Hospital. She has helped deliver baby horses, cows, goats, rabbits, kittens and puppies. Once she even helped her mom with a c-section on a cat that had been run over by a car. The kittens all lived. Horses, goats, calves, chickens, ducks, pigs, and even peacocks, were part of the daily routine.
Marylaura and her family also grew up going to the ranch. All the kids participated in working the cows which included penning, vaccinating, neutering, and loading them in the cattle trailer. Her great uncle Mally Keller raised Thoroughbred race horses and that was always a treat especially to see his big pretty stallions.
When Marylaura was about 12 she and her dad decided to start raising their own horses. After testing out a few auctions, they went from having just a few horses to about 20. Of course she tried to ride them all which most of them were not rideable She then started training horses – both young ones and retraining other horses. She learned a lot through trial and error and is now very successful with training just about any horse. She still raises a few babies just for fun.
Growing up, Marylaura always had a horse of her own. She started riding English and showing at age 6. Marylaura was teaching neighborhood kids to ride starting when she was 13. She received her real estate license before she graduated from high school. After high school she attended Southwest Texas State, Austin Community College and Texas A&M with a biology major.
She continued training horses and ponies and showing hunter/jumper until her first child was born and on and off since. Marylaura grew up riding ranch horses and horses in the back yard and then lessons started at age 5 with many different instructors and learned from them all. The original intent was Veterinary school but while teaching riding during college her love for it grew and in 1988 decided to move back to Austin and incorporated Hunters Chase Farms Inc.. Wimberley is where she now calls home.
Marylaura is happily married to Dale Doherty. With lots of beautiful grandchildren now that their kids are all grown-up.
Dale and Marylaura were married September 15th, 2005. This was who she has been looking for all these years. Dale is her partner in every way. He operates his own heavy equipment business. Dale was in the concrete business for many years, putting in slabs for houses all over Texas. The song “I’ve been everywhere man” is quite fitting. Dale is also an unbelievable heavy equipment operator and can get it done. He builds arenas, clears brush and trails fixes roads, rock removal and he creates the perfect dirt for Flower beds and lawns. Dale loves kids and is awesome with all the students and is a great dad to both of our kids and grand children. Dale gets the same glory from changing a kids life as Marylaura does. Dale has years of experience driving with a trailer and they do a lot of hauling and road trips together along with all the horse shows. Dale also raises miniature cattle and mini bucking bulls. Check it out at www.BigDMiniBuckingBulls.com
