The Portland daily press., 1878-06-12
AGRICULTURAL.
Summer Management for Hor,e..

Owners of horses have frequently been dis
appointed In the unsatisfactory results that
have attended the summering of horses which
have, for many months, been kept up at hard
work, in hot stables and on highly stimnla-
ting food, whose feet and legs have become
injured, and whose whole systems were more
or less fevered, and which have finally been
put out to pasture to alter their mode of life
for awhile, and to give them more air, cooler
lodgings, with more natural and less excit-
ing diet The objections to the ordinary
methods OF thus attempting to restore the
former condition of horses by simply a run
of few months in some scanty hill pasture
is, first, the length of time which is required
before the horse RECEIVERS from such a radical
change in bis mode of living; next, the prob
aolllty OF his coming up lame from gallopng,
playing and skylarking with other horses in
pastures, which, too frequently, the sun has
burned and baked as hard and nearly as
brown as turnpike road in July. The grass
al this period, in the average pasture, is apt
to be poor and innutritive; frequently there
Is a notable lack of shade and shelter, with a
plague of flies sufficient to torture a thiD-
skinned animal almost to death. Finally,
the animal OFTEN comes up in the Fall poorer
10 flesh than when he was turned out, sun
bleached, thin and dry in his coat, his hair
staring, his ribs bare, presenting the opposite
to what bis owner expected, after supplying
the means of Summers run and rest.
Experienced horsemen are now adopting,
in lieu of the above method, especially in the
case of valuable horses, the keeping the ami
mails up part of the time in large loose
box, if possible, opening to a soft, moist
well-shetered enclosure fenced off from the
main field or pasture; to take off his shoes,
stuff his ieet with cooling paste of tar, tai
low, clay and cowdung; to feed regularly and
plentifully with rich, moist, succulent, green
feed cut fresh every day, not forgetting fow
carrots and standing supply of few quarts
of oats per diem given part at each OF two
feelings. If the horse have the advantage of
good paddock or enclosure to run in, he
will not need much other exercise; but, at
all events, he will be better for being walked
out, or trotted gently, daily, on soft ground.
The advantages of some such method, varied
to suit the conditions and circumstances OF
the owner, are manifold. The animal is not
SO wholly depleted and reduced; he is not ex-
posed to hot suns, wet nights, cold storms or
extraordinary changes of temperature; he is
not tormented by flies, has no opportunity of
gallopipg the flesh off his bones or battering
his feet to pieces on the hard ground. In
short, the horse may have all the advantages
of a run at grass, with fewer drawbacks, and
when the time comes that is desired to again
bring him into condition, it can be done grad
ually and imperceptiby by decreasing the sup
ply of given food, while increasing that of
grain, adding more exercise, putting on extra
clothing and keeping the stable warmer. This
involves care and attention, it is true, but fine
animals, kept in good condition, are not the
result of careless Indifference or shiftless man
agement.-American Culticdtor.