STABLE MANAGEMENT 271 



finished feeding for the day, just before sunset, they usually 

 begin a game of romps and often take a sharp canter before 

 settling down for the night. When turned out they should 

 not be put into a meadow knee-deep in herbage, where they 

 will rapidly fill their stomachs with succulent grass ; instead 

 they should have the run of a bare field, where they will 

 have to work for their living, and it is often advisable to 

 let them succeed a herd of cattle who have eaten the 

 pasture nearly bare. The grass that springs up will then 

 be short and sweet, full of small clover and the finer grasses. 

 The objections urged against turning horses out are that they 

 batter their legs from stamping on the ground when teased 

 by flies, but this to a great extent is from the pernicious 

 habit of docking the tails of the poor animals, depriving 

 them of their natural means of defence. Horses with long, 

 flowing tails do not stamp, but simply switch away the 

 insect pests with a sweep of their tails.* If the weather 

 happens to be very hot, and the flies are very troublesome, 

 the horses may be brought into the stables in the early 

 morning and turned out again in the cool of the evening ; 

 but if they have long tails such precaution is not required. 

 They, Hke most other mammals, derive much benefit from 

 having the sun on their backs, and thrive in consequence. 

 One important thing to be on the look-out for is to see they 

 do not become infested with internal parasites, and if an 

 animal begins to look staring in its coat it is always wise to 

 take it into the stable for a day or two, and give it a vermi- 

 fuge. To guard against this evil, pastures where horses are 



■■'- On September 11, 1911, I watched two horses m close proximity in 

 a grass paddock near my house. One had but a very short dock, and 

 timing it by my watch I noted the animal averaged 28 stamps per 

 minute, besides constantly throwing back its head to its flanks, to drive 

 away the flies. The other animal had a long flowing tail down to its 

 heels, and during the whole time I was observing them it never made a 

 single stamp, nor did it lift up its head from grazing, although it had 

 a far thinner skin than the other. But the long tail was kept constantly 

 in motion, and it was entirely due to this that the animal was able to 

 graze in peace and comfort. 



It need, perhaps, hardly be added, the animal which had been docked 

 had not been mutilated whilst in my possession, but had been thus 

 barbarously treated by a former owner, before it became my property 



