SCHOOLING HUNTERS 



THE BEST AGE TO BEGIN MOUTHING AND LEARNING TO DRIVE 



SCHOOLING FOR SADDLE WORK LEARNING TO JUMP, 



RIGHT WAY LEARNING TO JUMP, WRONG WAY 



HEN in 1880 I moved into the Genesee 

 Valley and began the breeding, rearing, and 

 schooling of hunters, I was thoroughly green 

 at the business, and had quite as much to 

 learn of the colts and green hunters as they had of me. 

 Twenty-odd years of experience and observation before and 

 after this have produced some very decided notions as to 

 the best methods of schooling as well as breeding hunters. 

 Others, of course, may have succeeded as well as I on en- 

 tirely different lines, and as to the value of my system must 

 judge for themselves. 



We have shown in the previous chapter that a hunter's 

 education should begin before he is born. If the in-foal- 

 mare happen to have a foal-at-foot, a most excellent oppor- 

 tunity is offered to give both colts a kindergarten lesson in 

 cross-country work. The foal-at-foot will readily follow 

 its mother over a log or across a small ditch. Even if at 

 first it goes around the log and steps carefully down into 



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