In regard to park hacks and long-tailed saddle horses, the only way to solve the problem in this country of the two types, in horse shows, is to divide the classes having long tails and short tails. At present in horse shows in the saddle classes long-tailed and docked horses are frequently entered in the same class, which makes it doubly difficult for the judge,
at times causing his decision to depend largely upon his personal preference for long-tailed or docked horses. I would suggest, therefore, that in all shows where the long-tailed and docked horses are not divided into separate classes in advance, there should be an informal division made before the judging, very much as is done with respect to the championship classes, where the judges often are permitted to divide the classes into horses above and below 15.2.
Every horsewoman should have at least a general knowledge of when and with what to feed her horse. In general a horse should be fed three times a day, and the allowance for the average horse is four quarts of oats, at six in the morning, and as much hay as he will eat about an hour later. At noon two quarts of oats and hay about an hour later, and at night a bran mash composed of about two quarts of oats and an equal mash of bran, well salted. A horse should never be watered after eating. He should be watered about twenty minutes before his first morning meal and may be watered about twenty minutes before each of his other meals. There is no objection to watering him at other times, not after feeding, and in hot weather it is advisable to water him frequently. When watering a horse in the stable, he should be allowed to have as much as he wants to drink, but the water should never be very cold. In winter the
chill should always be taken off the water before it is given to the horse.
The above hours for feeding, except the hour for his breakfast, must, however, be modified by the time when he comes in from work, as a horse should always have a good rest and be thoroughly cooled off before he is fed oats. He can eat hay when he is hot but never oats.
Many horses will require more than the above allowance and many others less, and some horses require as much humoring about their food as a nervous child.
If a horse is very thin and not working hard, one of the best ways to fatten him is to give him light, steady work and mix molasses with his feed. If, however, a horse is becoming poor in spite of taking all his food, it is probably because his teeth are too long and need filing down, as a horse with long teeth will never masticate or digest his food properly.
With most horses, any food remaining in the manger after a meal should be taken out and thrown away, as the sight of it is apt to disgust them and put them off their feed.
A sweating horse should not be watered unless while on the road, in which case it does him no harm to give him, from time to time, a drink of not too cold water, but after each drink he should be walked
for five or ten minutes before taking up the trot or canter.