334 Western Live-stock Management 



by the draft horse buyers at the present time is an animal 

 with soundness, ruggedness, and the general character- 

 istics of serviceableness stamped upon her body and with 

 a certain degree of beauty. In selecting the mares, it 

 is better to procure one or two good mares that will pro- 

 duce the type of stock which is salable than to buy three 

 or four which ate off-type, unsound, or which may fail 

 to breed. It is not essential that foundation mares 

 weigh a ton, as often the extremely heavy mares are 

 coarse and masculine in appearance, and not as reliable 

 breeders as those of average weight and more feminine 

 appearance. 



FOUNDATION STALLIONS 



The sire of pure-bred horses is more than one-half the 

 stock. The reason for this is that he has one-half the 

 influence on the offspring, and in addition he is the adver- 

 tising and sale feature for the entire bunch. Occasionally 

 a mare will become noted for the kind of offspring which 

 she produces, but the sire is invariably the animal which 

 puts the breeder at the top with any kind of pure-bred 

 stock. On account of this, it is essential that the sire 

 be more than an average horse ; in fact he should be an 

 out-standing individual. More attention than usual 

 should also be paid to the breeding of such horses, espe- 

 cially among breeders of draft horses. There are few 

 draft horse breeders who are good judges of pedigrees. 



PEDIGREES AND REGISTRATION 



A pedigree in the broadest sense of the word is a record 

 of ancestry. In common use, however, the term is applied 

 to the published record of breeding and ancestry issued 

 by some association, organized for the express purpose 



