The Monitor-register., 1896-09-25
The Coming Horse Famine.

u. L. Kellogg, who has collected some
valuable statistics in regard to the horse
raising industry. says the world is awak-
ening to the fact that it stands upon the
very threshold of the greatest horse
famine it has ever known. Electric vehi.
Giles of different kinds and the bicycle are
making horse breeding Improbable, and
the worlds supply of horses must soon
be reduced to a minimum.
The government statistics of 1890
o ed that there were Is, 900, 900 horses
in the United States. Some Western
papers sent out parties some two years
ago to ascertain the true status of horse
breeding at that time, and the report was
that the breeding interests had fallen off
80 per cent. The immediate region about
Chicago has been one of the heaviest
breeding sections in the United States;
but the average decline throughout the
country may be safely put at rs per cent.
On this basis an estimate of the deficit
can be reached.
One million must be raised each year
to make good the death rate of 1000. 900,
but with the decrease of rs per cent. in
the breeding there must be a shortage of
5000 yearly, or 5000, 900 less of young
stock now in the country than there were
four years ago. This, with the amount
canned, 800, 900; with the number dying
by neglect, $50, 900, and the amount ex-
ported, $50. 900, makes $500, 900 horses
short. If to this amount is added the
yearly death rate of 1000, 900, multiplied
by four, an actual deficit is seen of
1900, 900 horses.
MIR. Kellogg holds that one side of this
question has not generally received
adequate consideration. One of the
great usurpers of the horse will be the
motor wagon. 1t is we'll known that on
ordinary steam tracks the more powerful
the locomotive the more weight it must
possess and the more perfect must be the
track. The same conditions must govern
the motor wagon. With roads especially
constructed for it, it will run; but with
the streets blocked with snow, the pave
ments coated with ice, and the country
roads submerged in mud, then you will
see the countenance of the farmer illu-
mined with an electric smile as he puts
his W price on his horse, and the next
season, in his ride to town, views the
electric wagon alongside the abandoned
steam pillow, orname nting some fence
corner"
Mr.. Kellogg further points out that,
contrary to the general belief, the use OF
steam and the locomotive have enormous.
ly increased the use, necessity and value
of the horse, because of the vast increase
of wealth and industry born of it. and,
in adding now forces to civilization, the
electric motor is opening out new fields,
which in itself it cannot fill, but in which
adapted to the horse are created.
AS illustrating the situation, reference
is made to the effect of the failing mule
supply on the Southern cotton yield.
During the blockade of the Confederate
ports the spindles of the world were
silent. Indispensable to the cultivation
of the cotton crop are the Negro and the
mule. Coequal with the destruction of
the horse has been the destruction of the
mule. The cotton States buy nearly all
their mules and horses instead of raising
them. With not enough brood mares in
the country to recuperate the horse stock,
what is the prospect for mules and the
cotton crop in the next seyen years ?
Will the electric wagon cultivate the
cotton crop?-N Veterinary Magazine.