TRAINING YOUNG HORSE STOCK.

Globe, Volume XXIV, Issue 2517, 3 May 1882, Page 3

TRAINING YOUNG HORSE STOCK.

A young horse can be educated to a degree proportionate with bis natural intelligence, and this intelligence and his traotability, as a rule, will be in the ratio of his breeding. If bo is highly bred, of any breed, whether trotter, Percheron, or Clydesdale, the chances are that he will be more susceptible to training than if of what is understood to be scrub origin. This is owing in part to that progress made by animals under domestication—progress in refinement of form, and certain other tendencies and acquirements which all educated breeders aim to fix. Men and children, by constantly coming in contact with those of better tone and more refined sentiments, imbibe these qualities to a degree, and their natures are improved. So it is with colts reared by men who are engaged in growing the better classes of stock, they usually get more intelligent handling than when in other hands, hence become more thoroughly domesticated. When wo consider how few horses there are (leaving out the old plough and team horses, accustomed all their lives to having the whiffletrees striking against their heels), that will permit the cross-bar or anything else to come against their hind legs when in harness, wo may well wonder why the promi nsnt lessons from colthood up are not as they should be to secure safety behind the horse's heels, under nearly every conceivable circumstance. The disposition to kick is implanted in most animals that have the round hoof, and in some whose hoofs are cleft. Especially does the horse look to his heels as his best and most reputable mode of defence. To kick, under circumstances where defence is thought necessary, is allowable in the horse ; nor does ho lose caste by this indulgence, if the provocation is great. But the horse that strikes with his forefeet, or uses his teeth —and where they do one of these things they Me quite likely to do both —takes a low rank, snd is a veritable hyena among horses. As a rule the horse showing, from his colthood np, a disposition to bite and strike, will prove, under ordinary care and handling, partially at least, beyond the reach of kindly tutorship. But the animal that, not having been fortified against sueb sudden surprises by previous training, shows a disposition to protect himself from anything that strikes him unexpectedly in the rear, is merely carrying out a warrantable instinct. Against this tendency to surprise, we have it entirely in our power to fortify him. This can bo done by a series of lessons, and they may begin when he is a young colt. Yet they may be deferred till he is of sufficient age to bo handled in harness. Perhaps the best way to familiarise tl e colt with the harness is to place this upon him while he is in his stall. In order to accustom him to work up to the collar, before hitching him to the waggon, harness him in his stall, hook his tugs to a whifflstree, attach a rope to this, running over a pulley or roller; append a heavy weight to the free end of the rope, and so adjust the fixtures that when the colt goes forward to the manger, or feed box, he will tighten the tugs, and lift the weight. In this exercise the pressure against the collar will become associated with his hay and grain, and it will be found that the association is by no moans on unpleasant one. So adjust the whiillatree —and let it be a very light one—that when the colt backs to the limit permitted by his halter, the whiffletree will come in contact with his heels. Be careful that he is accustomed to this, at first, in your presence, every precaution being taken to avoid a sudden surprise, involving a response from his heels. It is of the utmost importance that ho become accustomed to permit some unusual substance to dangle against his heels, that he may, in the future, permit this without kicking" This bo certainly will do if the lesson is given to him with discretion, not alone in the manner stated, but by a progressive plan, out of the stable. It will very rarely be necessary to show the colt, if he is of reasonably fair temper, that the master is his superior, physically, through the means of appliances that he uses upon him. If his duties are taught him through kindly lessons, and not through putting them'before him in the light of a series of punishments, by making him draw a load, when, perhaps, his breast or muscles are sore, even making the lesson impressive by the uss of the Ush, the colt of average intelligence and docility will take hold of his work willingly.