GENERAL RULES FOR STABLE MANAGEMENT.
The stable sergeant takes immediate charge of the police and sanitary condition of the stable, picket-line, etc., and is the custodian of the forage and stable property generally.
The stable is to be kept thoroughly policed, free from smells, and well whitewashed. There must be no accumulation of manure or foul litter inside, or near the doors or windows without. The feed-boxes are washed out frequently and kept perfectly clean. The ground about the picket-line is swept daily and all dung, etc., carried to the manure-heap.
Except at night, when the horses are bedded down, no manure or urine is to remain in the stalls; the stable police remove it as fast as it accumulates.
If practicable, all woodwork within reach of the horses and not protected with sheet iron or other metal is painted with thin gas-tar, to prevent its being gnawed; it should be thoroughly dried before putting horses near it. The same precaution must be followed with regard to troughs, picket-posts, and hemp picket-line.
Smoking in stables or in their immediate vicinity is prohibited.
One or more lamps will be hung in each stable, to burn during the night.
The horses are stalled according to their positions in the battery, the teams nearest the door being led out first; their places at the picket-line will be in accordance with the same rule.
The name of each horse, and that of his rider or driver, are placed over his stall.
Clay is the best for earthen floors, as it packs well. Gravel or sandy earth is not suitable. Each man is held responsible for the removal of the earth and the levelling of the floor of his stall.