Wisconsin State Agricultural Society. 
285 
“Horses,' 1 but there are few of greater practical importance—a 
touch of the epizootic proved that. It stopped the wheels of trade 
throughout the land; it stilled the wheels of the wagon, the steamer 
and the locomotive; and it brought home to man his dependence 
on the humbler animal. 
According to Ruggles, there were in Wisconsin, in 1850, 30,000 
horses; in 1860, 116,000, and in 1870,252,000. These figures speak 
for the present strength and growing greatness of the horse. 
Mr. Anderson. I think this is an important subject which we farm¬ 
ers ought to express our opinions about. I am very much in favor 
of farmers raising their own horses. I have advocated for }^ears the 
raising of heavy draft horses, the crosses of the Clydesdale horse 
with our mares, for instance. I think 1,400 pounds good weight 
for plow-horses, rather heavy for roadsters. I think the best thing 
we can do is to breed horses for our own use, and the best breed I 
think is from the Clydesdale horse with our common mares. 
Mr. Mitchell. I think the horse that I have given is the proper 
horse for the farmers use, sufficiently active for the road, and suf¬ 
ficiently heavy for the plow or wagon. 
Mr. Robbins. I am in favor of a lighter horse than the heavy 
draft horse. In my experience of thirty years, I believe that a 
horse for the farm should not weigh over 1,200 pounds. I have a 
team eighteen years old that I raised myself. I was offered six hun¬ 
dred dollars for them in this market when they were eight years 
old. They are my carriage team. I drive them seventy-five miles 
a day when I want to, and do my farm work with them equally well. 
They are a cross with the Canadian and Bullrush, Morgan on the 
father’s side and the Canadian mare on the mother’s side. I can 
plow an acre more a day with those horses than I can with the 
heavier horses, and I can cultivate two acres of corn in a day more 
than I can with the heavy sluggish horses. 
Mr. Whiting. I wish to ask one question. The gentleman has 
recommended us as farmers in the first place not to raise any horses. 
Now I wish to know what he would do? 
Mr. Mitchell. I would import them. They come from the south 
and it is simply a difference in transportation, and that is much less 
than raising them. 
President Bascom. There was one remark in the paper, that the 
