Jessie Dowling pets Maggie, one of several she keeps on Iron Ledge Farm in Whitefield. Dowling started horse training in 2024 after 17 years as a cheesemaker, which included founding Fuzzy Udder Creamery. (Ali Juell photo)
On a sunny Monday, Jessie Dowling stands in the middle of a fenced-in pen with three people and three horses at her farm in Whitefield. As the lesson nears its end, Dowling leads the pairs through a cooldown.
She instructs her students to take five deep breaths and to close their eyes in their final shared moments with the steeds.
“I like to imagine I’m breathing in through my heart and then out through their heart,” she said.
Moments like these have been a long time coming for Dowling. After 17 years in the cheesemaking business, Dowling has only recently started pursuing her true passion: owning and running Iron Ledge Farm in Whitefield.
Like many young kids, Dowling loved horses growing up. She said she knew working with horses was her calling after her parents got her a small Breyer horse toy.
“I had never really seen a horse, but I just knew that was what I was supposed to do,” Dowling said.
She started taking riding lessons but eventually drifted from the sport, partially because people continuously told her working with horses wasn’t a way to pay the bills. If she couldn’t work with horses, Dowling said she had to do the next best thing: milking goats and crafting cheese.
“I saw what kind of change you could make with local food,” Dowling said. “Growing healthy, local food just made sense.”
She worked at Appleton Creamery in Appleton for several years before creating her own cheese as the owner of Fuzzy Udder Creamery in Whitefield. She dove headfirst into running her own business, getting a herd of milking goats and working to perfect a range of cheeses.
“I loved making cheese; I loved eating cheese,” Dowling said. “But the thing that I really was connected to with Fuzzy Udder was the animals.”
In a return to her childhood interest, she decided to do the Mongol Derby – a 621-mile race through the Mongolian wilderness – in 2023. The ride required extensive training, which Dowling said only reignited her love for horses.
Around that same time, her cheese business was booming. Fuzzy Udder’s sales were ramping Countyup, Dowling was working on expanding the business, and her blue cheese was deemed the state’s best at the Maine Cheese Awards.
She was living a cheesemaker’s dream, but after 13 years of owning a creamery, Dowling said the experience only made her realize she couldn’t continue.
Jessie Dowling gets ready to store hay in the barn of her Whitefield property. The founder of Fuzzy Udder Creamery, Dowling sold the cheesemaking business last year in order to pursue her childhood dream of working with horses full time. (Ali Juell photo)
“I just felt hollow inside,” Dowling said. “I didn’t care that I had the best cheese. I wanted to do horses.”
To launch her dreams into motion, Dowling listed Fuzzy Udder for sale in January 2024. After selling the business to a couple from St. Louis, Mo., she secured a new property in Whitefield and started to build what is now Iron Ledge Farm at 21 Iron Ledge Lane.
In terms of running the new venture, Dowling said she has only recently found her footing. Her days are packed with teaching lessons, preparing for an upcoming race, or taking care of her horses.
It’s been exciting to teach people of all different skill sets, she said, especially introducing people who have never interacted with horses to the “beautiful world” that is working with animals.
“I think people are often wanting to find out their true purpose,” Dowling said. “I think people like having that opportunity to just focus on a skill they want to build.”
Dowling said she sees horse riding as a relationship between a person and the horse, which is why she incorporates things like breath work into her lessons. Trust and care are important for both the horse and the rider, she said.
“(Horses) speak through body language, and there’s so much they have to say,” she said.
On top of offering lessons, Dowling also organizes multi-day retreats for intermediate to advanced riders, which include rides, camping and opportunities to connect as a group. She’s working on the itinerary for her latest retreat in the fall, which will take riders through Aroostook County.
Her return to horse riding is coming full circle as one of her students prepares to ride in the Mongol Derby this year. Another one of her students plans to ride the race in 2026.
Dowling is also preparing to participate in her next big race – the Gaucho Derby in South America. As she gets ready to ride through Patagonia next year, she and her horses show no sign of slowing down.
“I still have a lot to learn,” she said. “I’m really just getting started.”
To learn more about Iron Ledge Farm, go to ironledgefarm.com or call 465-5255.
