The Florida agriculturist., 1906-03-14

horses of any other class, provided, OF
course, that it is good. There seem
to be greater demands for horses of
this class than any other. Further
more, the only class of horses that
are being exported for this country to
any extent at the present time are
carriage horses, for the reason that
foreigners will pay more for horses OF
that class than any othe-.
You know, of course, Our exporters
have practically gone out of business
in the last two Or three years on ac-
count of the high prices in this coun-
try, but they still export few car
riage horses. Another reason was
this: There is very alarming tenden-
cy among dealers in carriage horses IN
this country to buy up standard bred
trotting stations that have the round
! full-made carriage conformation and
| to sell these stations for harness
| horses. They are always docked and
usually castrated, although there are
some very notable exceptions. 1t aD-
pears to me that there is large de-
mand in this country for carriage
horses and we have here native stock
which, under ordinary methods, pro-
duces haphazard types of Offspr1ngs;
| fix a more desirable type with little
effort and concentration. And if the
stations of this type are being cas-
trated and sold for harness purposes
it will readily appear that the oppor-
tunity to establish such a breed is
rapidly being lost, and in the course
of time we would find that the stock
had been completely exhausted. 1t was
to save this blood and concentrate 1t
that we took up this work.
There are great many problems to
be solved in carrying it out One OF
the first is the problem of fixing the
type 1t is not yet definitely estab-
lished from just what families these
trotting breed carriage horses descen-
ded. | mean what families they came
from, although it is known within
general limits The horse dealers on
the Chicago market generally know
what stations all over the country
are string suitable horses for carriage
purposes But as a rule there is no
systematic breeding. 1t is at present
| what you might call a lottery. 1t
seems reasonable to assume that
horse breeder can be as sure or ap-
proximately sure of getting certa' re-
suits as the breeder of cattle, sheep Or
hogs One breeder of fraft horses
said if he got 70 per cent. OF the
matings to turn out as he wanted he
was satisfied. A breeder of carriage
type of horse might have to look for
a lower percentage. Now, in the trot-
ing horse, our American horse as we
have it at present. say this as
friendly not as a harsh critic-there
are a great many faults that are par
ticularly Objectionable. From the car
riage standpoint These faults must
be guarded against if the carriage
type is to be developed from the trot-
ting foundation. 1t is not necessary
!, to mention what these are-any horse
man knows without being told.
Now, the purpose of our work is
to establish a desirable type from this
trotting stock. We expect to get
horses that will sire good marketable
animals If this work is successful,
if we can show that a type of this
kind can be evolved, then we can
show the entire breed can be i'm
: proved and the faults elimated. Ii
farmer will breed to trotting bred
horse, and he will select one that
is of good size, of good conformation
: and action and hound, and viii con-
slider those points before considering
the speed of the horse, the chances