Rensselaer Union, Volume 6, Number 40, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 June 1874 — Training and Driving Colts. [ARTICLE]

Training and Driving Colts.

The warm days of spring usually put the youngsters of the family in mind of breaking or training colts. The animal passions are aroused in those who have seen them subdued by literally breaking their spirit, but not in those who have been taught that gentleness and patience are the most potent powers in subduing any of the domesticated animals. If the animal has been handled from the time it was a colt, it will usually submit to the bitting harness quietly. It may then be turned into some safe vard, and allowed to wander about at will tor an hour, care being taken at first not to check the head too high, but slightly above the natural position in which it is carried, or it may be exercised for a time at the end of a fifteen foot cord or strap, until it be somewhat tired. It may be checked up more and more each day, being gradually compelled to carry its heaa higher and higher. When it will walk or trot at command, or even before, the colt may be hitched alongside a steady old mare and driven. If frightened, it,will, if the driver keepscalm, soon recover, and usually proceed quietly enough; and, whenever it does so, it should soon thereafter be taken from tb* harness. As soon as it overcomes the

sense of fear at being harnessed, it may be put to light plowing by the side of a strong, steady horse, giving the colt, of course, the long end of the drawbar. Whatever the provocation t p anger, the driver should keep cool. At least, do not gel angry until the colt has forgotten the cause of the anger, if it consumes the whole day, for when both horse and driver get angry at the same time the two-legged brute is almost sure to give the quadruped a partial lesson by teaching it its own strength, and the lesson will never be forgotten. Patience and firmness are the powers that can make a horse or mule subservient to man. If the horse is a fine one, or likely to become valuable as a driving horse, it should never be put to drawing heavy loads at all, but must receive a very different course of training from that practiced on the ordinary horse. Its farm education, however, like that of any eolt,. should be commenced during the first winter of its life and should proceed thus up to the time it is two years past. Its real training should be commenced by exercising in the bitting harness, driving to a light vehicle beside a steady horse, never, however on long journeys, but only sufficient to harden its flesh and induce muscular development. At three years old and until it is four It should be driven with exceeding care, only enough for exercise, since it is a critical age for the colt for the reasdh that* it is the period when the second dentition takes place, and as a consequence the young animal cannot eat hard food so well as at a more advanced age. Indeed, all young-horses should be used carefully until they are six years old, and no horse should be put to fast and exhaustive work until period. If properly used until this time they will increase in stoutness, ability and speed until they are en or even twelve years of age.— Western Rural.