view raw text
OVERPRODUCTION IN ENGLAND Several Owners Destroying Youngsters Without Recommendations. Breeders Cannot Find Buyers for Mediocre-Yearlings Condition of the Foreign Markets Reflected in Action. Tc was reported some time ago that a well-known English breeder had caused several of his yearlings to be shot in preference to selling them at the low prices prevailing at the sales. Such procedure sounds rather drastic, but it would be same to wager that the youngsters destroyed had little to recommend them in looks, and the sale of several yearlings at low prices is a bad advertisement for any stud. Sir Robert Jardine used to destroy at times some of his young stock that, after being tried, were found to be lacking in speed; and a contributor to London "Sporting Life" writing under the pen-name of "Old Owner" said that several owners had done so without the fact being made public. "Some of the horses destroyed," he continued, "would have had a commercial value for export, or even to run at minor meetings in England, but rich owners in many cases would rather destroy than sell such as would only damage the prestige -of their studs." OF NO VALUE NOWADAYS. As "Old Owners" comments are of interest in America, as well as in England, I shall quote them: "There may," he writes, "have been a pearl among the yearlings recently destroyed by their breeder, but would that one have paid for the losses in training bills, entries and forfeits, traveling and jockeys fees incurred, over the others? Probably not. "At one time the two-year-old or three-year-old that was placed in a selling race in England had a definite commercial value to go to other countries, but at the present time the foreign market is stagnant. "The big demand for Indian that used to exist and Indian took high-priced as well as low-priced horses has greatly fallen off." "The South African market has dried up, partly owing to the universal depression there, and partly to the action of the, South. African government in imposing a duty of 100 on racehorses coming into the country. "Other countries which used to be good customers arc now taking no horses at all or else a mere 25 per cent of the old average. Practically the only market for the animal not good enough to win races on the flat is the pony racing, if he is of the right type. "The main reason for the accumulation of moderate horses is, of course, over production, a phenomenon observable in connection with practically every other commodity." The fact of many high class winners being the. progeny of mares that cost only a trifle was a great lure. "Old Owner" says that when, a man read that Mr. Edward Kennedy bought three mares at an aggregate of less fcan 200,, and bred from them Delatinay, Dark Ronald, and The Tetrarch, it all seemed so easy, and he hurried to take a hand in the great game. "Mares that should have gone to the kennels," he writes, "were bred from, and their offspring put on the market. "The same thing has applied in France as well as in England and Ireland, and also in the United States, where rich men have tried mass production methods of breeding. The result is that the principal horse-producing countries of the world are flooded with moderate animals which are unsaleable." "Old Owner" says that happily the get-rich-quick breeder the one who came in the height of the boom on the assumption that it was "easy money" is being squeezed out, and, unless he is lucky, this year will finish his activities in England. In a lesser degree something similar could be written about breeding in America. When the big prices were going a few years ago many went into it in the belief -it was a certain money-making business. Some have dropped out, and even our leading and experienced breeders have deemed it advisable to reduce the output from their studs.
