The Mitchell capital. (Mitchell, Dakota [S.D.]) 1879-1918, 1909-03-11
Farm Notes
DRAFT HORSES.

The weakest point in our draft horses
today is defective fore feet" is the opinion
of a st. Louis horsenlan. LAS nearly as l
can estimate from Investigations made
at the second hand sale stables, where
fully so per cent OF the draft horses that
are used upon that city's streets are
thrown aside, at least 10 per cent of the
draft iorses are rendered useless after u
10 Years service because of lalneness, the
seat OF which is in The fore feet.
Go onto a market with Il bunch of good
draft horses for sale and the first part of
the horse that buyers look at is the fore
feet, and if they are not sound and right
the price is Immediately cut down.
The fore feet are the most important
part of the horse from the users stand
point in the United States today, and very
little attention is paid to that point as u
rule.
The second weakest point is in the hook
joint, and about IL per cent OF the draft
horses III Cur large cities are discarded
because of weak. defective and unsound
hook Joints. These two, the fore feet and
the hook Joints, are points which We
should consider carefully.
Now, what are the Weaknesses in the
feet? We are using i'll this country more
loercherons than we are of all other draft
breeds together: they are the breed that
seems to bc the best suited to our Aneri-
can people. and the PercleTon horses fore
feet is perhaps his weakest point. Many
of them are too small: not small perhaps
at the surface of the ground, but small
where the hoof and the aair Join at the
loof-nead or coronet. This is the p~articu-
lar part of your Percheron horses feet,
which you should examine carefully in
looking for weakness in a breeding horse.
Gel a good large hoof-head, with plenty of
depth and width in hoof at the heel. then
see that the pastern or ankle blends
pinal,- info tho 1npf Tho ankle from tho
fetlock joint down to the foot in the
Percheron is frequently very short and
very straight, and II long, sets too far
back. Pasterns should have an ngle Of
about d degrees, but should be clean and
smooth and show lots of quality or fiber
and give a fun, nice, round blending of the
bone and sinew into the hoof. Now, then,
the foot itself. Get a foot that is wide
in the heel and deep from coronet to
ground surface. Get a horse with Il hoof
that is dense, that is, closeness of the
iibers altogether. You do not want q hoof
in which the tibers are not laid closely
together. giving you a smooth, hard bone
like horn. A hoof that is not smooth on
its surface, dense and close fibered, will
not hold the shoe and Mill wear off very
quickly if not shod.
when you look at the bottom of the
foot, get one that is concave. followed
up in the center and with a good, large,
full, well-developed frog. The frog is one
of the most important parts of the horses
foot. the cushion which is placed there
by Nature to break the conclusion as the
horse puts his foot to the ground. Very
frequently, as our horses are shod in this
country, the weight comes all outside on
the rim of the foot, which is not intended
to bear all the weight, but we have so
shod the horse in many instances that the
frog Is all drawn up and shriVeled and
the sale is flattened out"