198 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 



liundred colts on exhibition. In Henry county this year we had a show 

 in the month of October, where we had one hundred and three colts. 

 So far as I know that is the largest colt show that has been held in this 

 state. 



This colt show work has been extended until at the present time the 

 shows include classes for one year olds, two year olds, brood mares and 

 farm teams, and, in my judgment, this work in the future will take on 

 more the form of a horse show. We will have classes for colts, yearlings, 

 two year olds, brood mares and farm teams. In my judgment, two of 

 the most important classes are those for farm teams and brood mares. 



Last Saturday I judged a show at Alleman, a little town between 

 Ames and Des Moines on the Interurban. We had an exceptionally good 

 exhibit notwithstanding the fact that it rained all the night before, and 

 until noon the next day. We had lined up there, fourteen farm teams 

 weighing from three thousand to forty-two hundred pounds each. I 

 want to tell you that it was a sight worth while for anyone to see. We 

 had that same day in the class of brood mares, nineteen, and there were 

 at least a dozen of those mares that weighed from eighteen hundred up. 

 Now that is something you could not have found five years ago or 

 ten years ago in that section. I know of sections today where these 

 colt and horse shows have been held for ten or twelve years, where 

 within a radius of five miles you can find at least twenty brood mares 

 weighing over eighteen hundred pounds each. Horse buyers from New 

 York City and Chicago have told me that in the vicinities where horse 

 and colt shows have been held, the horses bring in the market today, 

 twenty-five and fifty dollars more than in communities where such shows 

 have not been held. I think that ultimately this work will be organized 

 in every county in Iowa. The county leading today is Polk county. Polk 

 county last year held seven shows. This year Polk county is to hold 

 seven more shows. I know what the horses are in this county — what the 

 classes of yearlings are, what the two year olds are, and the brood mares, 

 and I want to tell you that there has never been a colt show or a horse 

 show held in a community where it has not stimulated a greater inter- 

 est in horses, a desire for better h'orses in that community. 



How shall we organize? These shows are organized in different 

 ways. I find that there is no one way which is best. One community 

 will organize in connection with the Farmers Institute work. Polk 

 county follows this method. At each one of these seven institutes held in 

 Polk county there is one day devoted to the horse show. They also 

 have domestic science, corn, sheep and cattle shows. Sioux county, 

 Henry county. Sac county and a good many other counties are holding 

 horse shows as a part of the Farmers Institute work. In some counties 

 these shows are organized by horse breeders' organizations. The stallion 

 owners put on the horse shows. In other communities it is the business 

 men of the town who put on the shows. In other localities it is the 

 bankers who handle the same. At Whiting, Iowa, the Whiting bank put 

 on a horse show a year ago at which there were sixty-nine entries. I 

 judged the same show this year, and it had on,e hundred seventy-five en- 

 tries. I want to say that it was an exceptionally good show — one hundred 

 seventy-five entries coming from four townships in one county, and they 



