Ever driven by a picturesque horse farm and yearned to get a closer look or learn more about what goes on there?

Folks will get their chance to do just that on Sunday, Aug. 12 as the Metamora Hunt Club will host its annual stable tour from noon to 4 p.m.

“This is the 10th year that we’ve done this,” said Joe Maday, one of the club’s three Masters of the Fox Hounds. “Everyone truly enjoys it.”

The event is a self-guided tour of six local horse farms that gives folks a chance to check out the stables, meet some horses and learn more about the equestrian community by interacting with the owners and asking questions.

Maday, a Metamora resident, said it’s one thing to pass these farms while traveling down a dirt road, it’s quite another to experience them and “get a real sense of their beauty.”

Three of this year’s farms are located in Metamora Township. As for the others, they are in Oxford, Dryden and Lapeer townships.

Because these farm owners’ value their privacy and security, the exact addresses will not be released prior to the tour.

However, Maday noted a couple of the farms have rich histories, one specializes in Arabian horses and one specializes in the equestrian sport/art of dressage, which involves training a horse to perform precision movements in response to signals from its rider.

Those who wish to take the tour must meet at the hunt club’s kennels at 5614 Barber Rd. in Metamora between 11:30 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. There, they will receive a map containing the locations of the six farms. The tour takes approximately two to three hours and it will held rain or shine, so participants are advised to dress appropriately for comfort and weather.

Tickets for adults are $25 each. For kids under the age of 12, the cost is $5 each. Tickets can be purchased in advance at the White Horse Inn in downtown Metamora or by calling Maday at (586) 381-8834. They can also be purchased on the day of the event at the club’s kennels.

Proceeds will be used to maintain the bridle paths – trails used for horseback riding – in Metamora Hunt country.

The Metamora Hunt Club is a private organization that specializes in foxhunting, a sport that involves dapperly-attired, mounted riders pursuing game – either fox or coyote – across the countryside with a pack of hounds specially bred and trained for this purpose.

“It is a very exciting way to get out, ride cross country (and experience) our beautiful countryside,” said Maday, who’s been a club member since 1990. “You’re out there early in the morning, seeing a lot of wildlife. On a nice fall day, there’s nothing better.”

These days, the hunt club members chase more coyote than fox just because the former is more common. “There’s just so many coyotes in the area,” Maday said.

An animal’s death is not the objective of the modern hunt. A successful hunt involves getting a fox or coyote to “go to ground,” meaning it takes shelter somewhere, usually underground, to evade the pursuing hounds hot on the trail of their scent.

The Metamora Hunt Club is celebrating its 90th anniversary this year. Organized on Jan. 6, 1928, the club’s original hunting grounds once encompassed approximately 15 square miles in Lapeer County’s Metamora and Dryden townships and Oakland County’s Oxford and Addison townships.

Foxhunting isn’t nearly as popular as it was 90 years ago because suburban sprawl turned many farms into subdivisions and automobiles replaced horses, according to Maday.

“People are no longer exposed to horses in their daily lives,” he said. “Each generation takes us further away (from the horse-and-buggy days).”

Despite this, the hunt club is still “doing well,” according to Maday.

Today, the club has more than 100 members and approximately 60 hounds. The hunt’s boundaries extend from Ray Rd. to Sutton Rd. and from Metamora Rd. to Havens Rd.

Maday believes it’s important for the hunt club to endure because “it’s a link with our past out here.”

“It’s a way to connect with rural America – keep that tie,” he said.

For more information about the Metamora Hunt Club, visit www.metamorahunt.com.