No. 4. 



Damp Stables. 



131 



To the Editor of the Farmers' Cabinet. 



Damp Stables. 



Sir, — When I came to t!ie farm which I 

 now hold by purchase, I found tlie stables 

 built under large trees and near a spring of 

 water, with a northern aspect; my horses 

 were soon in poor condition, with long and 

 rough coats, and almost always lax in their 

 bowels, nor could I get them up by extra food 

 or lighter work; but my cows suffered most, 

 for they were always sick ; their milk fell 

 off, and their butter was poor and of a bad 

 colour and taste, and four of them slipped 

 their calves before their time; when the 

 spring came, they left their winter-quarters 

 in a worse state than I had ever seen them, 

 and two of them died from the scours on go- 

 ing to pasture. On enquiry, I found that the 

 tenant who had left, had always been, what 

 the neighbours termed, unfortunate in his 

 horses and cattle, and from that cause, more 

 than any other, he had not been able to make 

 both ends meet. The truth flashed upon me 

 in an instant, and in a very little time longer 

 than it has taken me to tell you my story, I 

 had commenced pulling down the stable, the 

 unhealthiness of which had been, I was con- 

 vinced, the cause of all the evil and all the 

 loss, and it was not more than two days be- 

 fore there was not left one stone upon an- 

 other of the whole fabric. I now set to work 

 and erected another on higher ground, re- 

 moved from water and clear from the shade 

 of trees, with a south-east aspect and dry ca- 

 pacious yard ; and from that day I have had 

 neither sickness nor sorrow in my out-door 

 household ; my horses live on less food, are 

 always sleek and in good working condition, 

 and my cows are a credit to their keep; our 

 butter brings two cents a pound more in the 

 market, and for the last year our sales are 

 more than doubled from the same number of 

 cows, and the same pasturage ; and no more 

 premature calves. Instead of watering my 

 cattle, as heretofore, at the spring under the 

 trees — the water cold, with a deadly taste 

 and bad colour — I sunk a well and put in a 

 pump, and at a long trough in the yard for 

 the summer, and another under shelter for 

 the winter, my cattle slake their thirst, with- 

 out setting up their coats as they always used 

 to do afler drinking at the hole under the 

 trees; even when the weather was warm, 

 they were accustomed to shake all over as 

 though they were in a fit of the ague, after 

 drinking their fill of this water; and to this, 

 with the bad aspect of the stables, I attribute 

 all the sickness and misery which I have ex- 

 perienced amongst my cattle and horses. 



I have been induced to tell you the above, 

 by reading in a valuable English work, called 

 " Stable Economy," some observations which 



would go to show that the writer, like myself, 

 had enjoyed the experience of the truth of 

 what he so well describes; and as they fully 

 corroborate all my convictions, I should be 

 glad of the opportunity to present your read- 

 ers with what he advances on the subject, if 

 it meets with your approbation, and am, your 

 constant reader, M. 



"A damp stable produces more evil than a 

 damp house ; it is there we expect to find 

 horses with bad eyes, coughs, greasy heels, 

 swelled legs, mange, and a long, rough, dry, 

 staring coat, which no grooming can cure. 

 The French attribute glanders and the farcy 

 to a humid atmosphere, and it is a fact that 

 in a damp situation we find these diseases 

 most prevalent : when horses are first lodged 

 in a damp stable, they soon show how much 

 they feel the change ; they become dull, lan- 

 guid and feeble, the coat stares, they refuse 

 to feed, and at fast work, they cut their legs 

 in spite of all care to prevent them — this 

 arises from weakness: and while some of the 

 horses catch cold, others are attacked by in- 

 flammation of the throat, the lungs or the 

 eyes ; most of them lose flesh rapidly, and 

 the change produces most mischief when it 

 is made in the winter season. Horses in con- 

 stant and laborious employment must have 

 good lodgings and kind treatment, but where 

 the stables are bad, the management is sel- 

 dom good, and it is no exaggeration to say, 

 that hundreds of valuable horses are destroyed 

 every year by the combined influence of bad 

 stables and bad management. And although 

 excessive toil and bad food have much to do 

 in the work of destruction, every hostile 

 agent operates with most fierce, where the 

 stables are of the worst kind. 



Stables should always be erected on dry 

 ground, or that which will admit of perfect 

 draining, with the surface a little sloping. 

 Stables built in a hollow or on marshy land, 

 are always damp, and when the foundations 

 are sunk in clay, no draining can keep the 

 walls dry, the dampness will follow up the 

 walls from the deepest foundation : it is true 

 that damp stables may be rendered less un- 

 comfortable, by strewing the floor with sand 

 or saw-dust, and, in some cases, a stove-pipe 

 might be made to pass through the stable 

 near the floor, but such stables are liable to 

 frequent and great alterations of temperature 

 at every change of the state of the atmo- 

 sphere. Some of the means usually employed 

 against dampness in dwelling-houses might 

 be adopted in the construction of stables, so 

 as to prevent the walls from absorbing the 

 moisture of the soil, such as a foundation of 

 whinstone to the surface of the ground, co- 

 vered with a coat of Roman cement or a 

 sheet of lead ; or the foundation may be sunk 

 so low as to admit of its bein? laid in coal- 



