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Lyttelton Times, Volume XXV, Issue 1687, 14 May 1866, Page 3

House Stock.—What with the scarcity of feed and the rapid increase of horse stock in all parts of the country, it is becoming now a puzzle amongst land owners what they are to do with their surplus horse flesh. They cannot sell them. Every town is fully ransacked with animals of all degrees, and even valuable and well-bred horses are now becoming unsaleable. At a horse sale in this district the other day, well-bred light and draught yearlings and two year olds were knocked down at ten shillings a head, and fine horses are offered in the Braidwood sale yards every week almost for which no offer can be obtained, or else so small a one as not to pay the expense of driving from the station. But the most difficult matter is to get clear of the bush horses which overrun so many stations. Good horses can be kept for a more saleable season, but scrubbers are not worth keeping at any price, and in many places they are being all shot, and the exterminating process is found to be the only alternative. The increase in horse flesh is not confined to the settled districts. The squatters in the vicinity of Dubbo are complaining of the trouble, annoyance, and loss which wild unbranded horses cause them. The eat the grass of the arid runs, and destroy the dams and waterholes which are constructed. A pool of water which would suffice for months for a flock of sheep is in a few weeks rendered valueless by these horses, which, not content with satiating their thirst, puddle and lay down in the holes. So troublesome is becoming the nuisance, says the local journal, that on one station a reward for each horse shot is paid, and we understand it is the intention of several other squatters to commence a similar exterminating process.— Braidwood Dispatch.