Planning a Stud Farm. 9 



less prevents them lying down iu comfort together; and, 

 when confined to quarters owing to stress of weather or ill- 

 ness, they cannot take proper exercise. 



SAND RING. 



With regard to the Circular Sand Ring, it would be 

 difficult to over-state its utility on a stud farm. If there is 

 one indispensable adjunct to the " ideal " stud, it is this 

 " magic circle.'* Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter, 

 the stud groom finds it equally useful. It should be located 

 with a view to its equal accessibility from both foaling and 

 general brood mares' boxes, and be about 90ft. in diameter, 

 surrounded by a close-boarded fence 7ft. high. When it is 

 under construction, particular care should be taken to 

 ensure quick and perfect drainage, to prevent its becoming 

 water-logged in rainy weather. The ordinary soil should be 

 removed to a depth of eighteen inches. A foundation of 

 coarse porous gravel, to the depth of a foot, should replace 

 this soil, and then comes a top coating of fine, sharp sand 

 to the depth of at least six inches. Though a square enclo- 

 sure would be better than no enclosure at all, yet the ideal 

 shape for this yard is a true circle, in which a young flighty 

 mare with her inexperienced foal at foot, enjoying their 

 first spell of outdoor freedom after close confinement in the 

 foaling box, would be less likely to come to grief during 

 their light-hearted frolics, than in a square yard, with its 

 four abrupt corners. For the same reason the circular yard 

 lends itself to the lungeing of yearlings. If properly 

 drained, the " going " is never too holding in wet weather, 

 and when frost threatens, a very thin coating of litter will 

 keep the " bone " out of the ground, so that in-foal mares, 

 which otherwise, owing to the paddocks being frost-bound, 

 would have to be kept indoors, can in small batches stretch 



