FARMER'S CYCLOPEDIA OF LIVE STOCK 



hand, horses which are accustomed to 

 passing the winter in cold stables, might 

 be injuriously affected by being kept in 

 artificially warmed stables with a com- 

 paratively high temperature and mois- 

 ture content of the air. 



The use of range horses in the East 

 has increased so much of late that a 

 brief mention of the industry seems desir- 

 able. Range horses are brought east 

 more and more from year to year. At 

 first a considerable market for them was 

 found in St. Paul, Kansas City, St. 

 Louis and Chicago. They are now 

 brought into New York, New England 

 and elsewhere in quite large numbers. 

 Range horses in skillful hands are more 

 easily broken than is commonly sup- 

 posed and the prejudice against brands 

 is disappearing. 



Age of horses — The average age of 

 usefulness of a horse may be set down 

 as about 18 years, although many of 

 them are not very effective after reach- 

 ing 12 years of f.ge. Horses frequently 

 live beyond 30 years, and occasionally to 

 the age of 40 or 50 years. There are 

 mares on record which have produced 

 32 colts and quite often horses are ca- 

 pable of working up to the age of 25 or 

 30. Thoroughbred mares may be bred 

 to a somewhat older age than draft 

 mares. Thus, many breeders use thor- 

 oughbred mares up to the age of 22, 

 but draft mares are usually bred only 

 to the age of 15 to 18 years. As a rule, 

 stallions are not good for service past 

 the age of 20. Geldings are preferred 

 by some horse users and mares by others. 

 The differences in the effectiveness of 

 geldings and mares are not great enough 

 to be of any note. According to some 

 Russian authorities, geldings are slightly 

 more susceptible to disease than mares, 

 but the statistics on this point are not 

 extensive enough to be of much value. 



Blanketing horses—Blankets are not 

 always used in a rational manner in 

 protecting horses. Thus when a blanket 

 is placed in immediate contact with a 

 horse underneath the harness, especially 

 in the case of horses which are kept at 

 severe work in winter, they sweat quite 

 profusely while in motion and when at 

 rest must suffer from the cold on ac- 

 count of being moist and covered with 

 a moist blanket. Better results in equal- 

 izing the temperature would be ob- 

 tained by working horses without blan- 

 kets and blanketing them while at rest. 



The only justification for fastening blan- 

 kets on working horses in cities is that 

 the owners cannot always depend upon 

 the drivers to place blankets on them 

 when the horses are at rest. In Utah, 

 the matter of blanketing horses was 

 studied with reference to the effect upon 

 the gains in horses and the amount of 

 food eaten. It was found that when 

 blankets are worn daily while the horses 

 were at work, they proved a source of 

 irritation to the horses, and blanketed 

 horses lost in weight, while those which 

 were not blanketed during the working 

 hours gained slightly on the same ration. 



Grooming horses— It has been found 

 by experiment that the weight of per- 

 spiration which passes through the skin 

 of the horse during a hard day's work 

 equals that of the feces. It is apparent, 

 therefore, that a large amount of solid 

 waste material in the perspiration must 

 become deposited on the skin and in the 

 hair. This is particularly true of horses 

 kept at hard work and confined in sta- 

 bles during the resting hours. When 

 horses are turned out to pasture and 

 not worked, the amount of perspiration 

 s exceedingly small, and the consump- 

 tion of green grass and other laxative 

 feeds makes it unnecessary to pay much 

 attention to the care of the skin. In the 

 stable, however, this is an important 

 matter. The mere presence of flies or 

 other similar external sources of annoy- 

 ance is sufficient to cause some worry 

 on the part of the horse and actual loss 

 in weight, or at any rate the use of more 

 food for the same amount of work. 



Similarly with an unclean skin, the 

 itching caused by the presence of this 

 filth on the skin is sufficient to worry 

 the horse, and the digestive and other 

 functions are also influenced unfavor- 

 ably by the unhealthy condition of the 

 skin, which results from lack of care. 

 There is, therefore, abundant renson 

 for grooming horses quite aside from 

 the mere consideration of appearance. 

 MacNeilage found that throughout the 

 northern part of Scotland, horses are 

 commonly groomed three times daily, 

 while some distillery and brewery horses 

 were groomed five times per day; viz., 

 at 5 and 11 a. m., and at 12.30, 6 and 8 

 p. m. When the horses are returned to 

 the stables in a sweaty condition, they 

 are first treated with an iron scraper, 

 then rubbed with a wisp of straw or 



