CHOOSE THE MARES.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Volume XI, Issue 512, 11 October 1900, Page 14

CHOOSE THE MARES.

A successful business man, says a writer in the American Horseman, who has grown wise with his years of experience as a breeder, which ind,ustry he took up as a side issue and as a source of pleasure several years ago, recently sold a young stallion of much promise to a man just startirg in the horse business. When the deal

was completed, and the younger man was about ( to depart with his purchase, the ise man gave hjm some fatherly advice, which ran something like th'.a .: “ In starting out to make a reputation for this horse ro not allow him to serve indiscriminately all the mares that may be offered Never mind the loss of income that you think you will' suffer if you turn some of the mares away, but be firm in your determination to let him have nothing but first-class mares until he cfth make a reputation as a sire of shapely colts. Do not overlook the fact that your horses will be charged with all the faults colts show, no matter if nine tenths of the defects are inherited direct from the mares. You must see that the mares are sound and of good conformation. You have gone to a great deal of trouble to find a

high-class horse, and you must mate him to highclass mares. If you do not you will pay for your folly in the dollars and cents that will go to your neighbour, who is shrewd enough to protect his horse until his reputation is assured.” The force of this argument will be fully appreciated by stallion owners who, in their zeal to increase the amount of their horse’s income, have been induced to mate him with mares which their judgment should have told them would make a poor nick. Everybody sees the poor colts, and a stallion must have a great reputation as a sire in order to live down the talk created by a very few coarse or inferior youngsters, that may in reality owe their objectionable features to their dams.