IV] 



FEEDING, EXERCISE AND TRANSPORT 



37 



greedy feeding or bad teeth. Horses that suffer 

 from looseness or diarrhoea while at work are 

 not generally affected by changing the food. The 

 cause is a nervous affection generally, the result 

 of the absorbing power of the intestines becom- 

 ing temporarily paralysed, or, at any rate, 

 checked, allowing the fluid to pass into the 

 rectum. This affection is chiefly in the floating 

 colon. 



Horses that have been troubled with fever in 

 the feet, probably due to over-feeding and want 

 of exercise, must be regularly exercised and care- 

 fully fed, with only a small ration of grain ; 

 beans and peas must not be fed, as they are too 

 heating. Horses with broken wind should have 

 their hay wetted with lime-water or brine, 

 and should be given food free from dust. They 

 must not be worked for a long period after 

 feeding. 



146. Feeding after Foaling. After foaling, 

 the mare has to eat sufficient food to feed herself 

 and her offspring. This must, therefore, be 

 borne in mind. For several weeks after foaling, 

 the feed should consist of crushed oats, with 

 boiled oats at night. She should be given little 

 quantities often, as much as she will eat. Later 

 on she can be given uncrushed oats. It will do 

 no harm to allow the foal to nibble at its 

 mother's oats if it wants to. Linseed meal 

 should be added to the mare's feed. 



147. Nosebags. Nosebags, when properly 

 cleaned and properly fitted, and made with air- 

 holes, are very useful articles for the horse to 

 feed from if it is inconvenient for him to be 

 placed in his stable. A box on a stand, however, 

 is more comfortable and more sanitary. The 

 nosebag must be kept thoroughly cleaned, and 

 must be strapped up higher as the contents 

 become less. If possible, a box or other support 

 should be given to the horse to rest his nose- 

 bag on. I cannot do better than quote from the 

 Buffalo Horse World : " For a moment put your- 

 self in the position of a horse forced to feed out 

 of some of our nosebags. His head is encased in 

 a close-fitting, wholly unventilated, foul and 

 heavy attachment in the shape of a bag. Though 

 his lips are very flexible and constructed so that 

 his mouth can perform some of the functions of 

 our hands, the horse cannot reach his food. He 

 is compelled to toss the bag upwards so that the 

 last of his feed may come within reach, and the 

 grains get into his nostrils and cause great 

 annoyance. With his breathing hindered and 

 his nostrils clogged, he is in far more pain and 

 distress than a horse that gets a cut from the 

 whip." 



148. Causes of Thinness. When a horse 

 living under ordinary conditions is found to be 

 thin or emaciated, a careful investigation must 

 be made at once. The following points must be 

 ascertained : 



Does he get his feed? Is he fed regularly? 



Is he watered sufficiently and regularly? Does 

 he bolt his food? Do other horses steal his oats? 

 Do his teeth trouble him? (There may be pieces 

 of wood wedged in between his molars.) Is his 

 tongue sore? Has he worms? And is his urine 

 all right? Great care must be taken that he 

 really gets his feed, and that it is not being 

 systematically stolen by the groom. A horse, if 

 in reach of another feed, must be racked up on 

 the upper chain until the other horses have 

 finished their oats. 



Under-feeding is, I fear, only too common in 

 poor districts. The chief culprits in Canada are 

 the Jewish population. The S.P.C.A. have much 

 work before them in this line. Any man who 

 would under-feed a horse should be put in prison 

 and starved himself. 



149. Stowage of Forage. Oats should ba 

 stored in small bins lined with zinc, in the loft. 

 These bins must be in dry places. (See Chapter 

 VIII.) When oats are used in large quantities, 

 large bins with wooden floors, ten to fifteen feet 

 square, are made in the loft, the oats being 

 shovelled out when required ; but, if possible, 

 they should be metal-lined. Every precaution 

 should be taken to keep rats and mice away. 

 Unthreshed oats should be kept in a stack, 

 thatched with straw. Hay keeps best in the 

 stack, with a good straw-thatched roof. 



Watering 



150. Without water a horse will live only a 

 day or two, but he will live much longer with- 

 out food. He must be watered at least three 

 times a day, but, as his large intestines are very 

 large, unlike his stomach, he can take in a large 

 supply of water at a time. He should be watered 

 last thing at night, say at 9 p.m., especially 

 in hot weather. He should always be watered 

 before a meal, as the water will be required to 

 assist in the digestion of the grain, etc., besides 

 quenching his thirst. The amount of water 

 required varies very much. In hot weather, with 

 hard work, he may require fifteen gallons a day, 

 whilst in cold weather, when idle, he may only 

 drink a bucketful (four gallons). Eight to ten 

 gallons a day is an average all the year round. 

 The Government allowance on service, where 

 there is a scarcity of water, is ten gallons, but, 

 as a rule, a horse is allowed as much as he 

 wants. A horse will drink as much as from four 

 to six gallons at a time when thirsty. I knew of 

 one horse (15.2 hands) drinking ten gallons at 

 once. 



Horses must never be watered for one hour or 

 one hour and a half after feeding grain (two 

 hours after rice). If water is allowed to pour 

 through the stomach en route to the caecum and 

 colon, it will wash the undigested grain into the 

 small intestines, where the grain will lie and 

 ferment and cause colic. Horses, while grazing, 



