The Colfax gazette. [volume] (Colfax, Wash.) 1893-1932, 1901-11-08
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A belief exists all over the east that
in the future the west can be depended
upon to supply horses at a less cost
than eastern farmers can afford to
raise them. A months sojourn in TIE
west looking up the horse industry
leads me to the conclusion that such
belief is unfounded says G. D. Smead
in The National StOckman. The Dlain
facts are that the low prices of a few
years past have more effectually driven
the western breeder out of breeding
horses than the eastern breeder. True
there are horses found in plenty in the
sale stables, but the quality of them is
poor, in fact very poor in many cases.
Scarcely first class carriage, coach or
draft horse can | find. By far too
many of them are 100 pounds too
light for carriage horses, and when 7
do find one large enough with a kind
disposition and intelligent | find him
| with poorly formed limbs, too upright
pasterns, weak at the knees and stiff
in the shoulders.
The drafters we find more of size and
| Junk headednesS than of intelligence.
nervous energy and conformation such
as will stand the work required of them
when put to use. The best horses of all
| classes have been picked up and the
culls left, is about the situation in the
west. Many whom | find breeding
horses are patronizing stations of but
| mighty poor merit. True, there are
here and there trotting sires which
have size enough and a record made on
some race track. and that is about all
they have to recommend them. They
sition, blemished limbs or thick wind.
Others are nice little fellows, kind
| enough, sound enough, but have not
size adequate to produce horse large
enough to draw carriage.
In the coach class | have found stall
| lions with goose necks, rat tails, meaty
| legs and leggy action peddled about as
| ideal coach horses and patronized by
farmers simply because they were i'm
| ported. | know of no other reason.
| True merit they were nearly devoid of.
| And we find many of the draft sres
little or no better Many have been
shown US with hollow backs. high hips,
crooked legs, tied in at the knees and
sickle hooks, They weighed perhaps
LOO pounds or more.
There are, no doubt, good sires in the
country west of the Mississippi, but
they are comparatively scarce. There
| are some very good mares left there yet
on the farms, which would if bred to
| the right kind Of sires produce good
horses. But with the sres at present
| there no considerable number of first
class horses will come to eastern mar
| kcts for some years. This can be de-
pended upon. The west has seemingly
| been made the dumping ground for the
Gull stations Of the eastern states.
Shredded Fodder For Horses
think that shredded corn fodder
makes as good or better feed THAI hay
| for horses through the winter, says A.
J. Daft in Prairie Farmer. One Of my
neighbOrs has Wntered about 300
sheep on shredded fodder, and they
look better the two last winters than
| they did when they were fed hay My
| experience has been that 1t makes one
| of the best feeds that one can have,
and the expense is not SO great when
| two or three neighbors work together
| But the fodder must be dry when it is
| cut, as otherwise it will mold in the
bin or NOW and so prove worthless.
There will be large quantities cut this
| fall on account of the scarcity of hay.
| and there will be an increased demand
| for fodder cutters and shredders