MANAGEMENT OF THE STALLION. 55 



Unfortunately for the horse breeding busi- 

 ness, in most rural districts stallions are not 

 worked. After the season, perhaps from the 

 middle to the end of July, the horse is too often 

 banished from active participation in the life 

 of the farm. He is seldom groomed, his stall is 

 cleaned out perhaps on rainy days, and such ex- 

 ercise as he gets he must needs take in a small 

 lot which in a rainy time becomes a manurial 

 quagmire. His rations are cut down almost to 

 the vanishing point, all except the hay, and of 

 that he gets about all he will eat much to his 

 detriment. As cold weather comes along the 

 horse gets less and less care, the dandruff in his 

 coat accumulates, and if he is of a hairy-legged 

 sort his shanks get into bad shape. Along about 

 the end of February his owner, with the avowed 

 intention of getting the horse ready to make a 

 season, begins to tear out the thick dirty coat 

 and pour feed into the horse. A more .or less 

 spasmodic attempt is made at exercising the 

 poor beast, and when the first mares come along 

 he is expected to be in proper fix to get them 

 with foal. A worse method of treating a stal- 

 lion could hardly be devised. 



If anyone can not see that it is to his interest 

 to work his stallion and persists in keeping an 

 idle horse about his premises to be nothing but 

 an expense for two-thirds of the year, then let 

 him stable the horse properly, feed him grain 

 sufficient to keep him in round flesh at all times, 



