Day: March 7, 2020

AMERICAN QUARTER HORSE HEIGHT: 14.2–17 hands ORIGIN OF AMERICAN QUARTER HORSE  : North America; originated along the eastern seaboard and solidified into a breed on the ranches of the American West SPECIAL QUALITIES: Exceptional athleticism and versatility; extreme speed for short distances; most highly developed “cow sense” of any breed BEST SUITED FOR: Ranch work; short-distance racing, cutting, reining, and other competition The American Quarter Horse is truly an American creation. It may be the first horse “type” to have been deliberately produced on this continent. Its history can be traced back even before the earliest days of the American colonies, all the way to the official royal breeding farms established on this continent by the very early Spanish in what is now the southeastern section of the United States, an area then known as Spanish Guale. The Quarter Horse’s pedigree includes Spanish Barbs, Colonial mid-Atlantic Quarter-Pathers, Rhode Island racing stock, English Thoroughbreds, Andalusians, Mustangs, and the small but excellent horses of the Chickasaw Indians,

BRABANT HORSE HEIGHT: 15.2–17 hands PLACE OF ORIGIN: Belgium SPECIAL QUALITIES: Massively built; can weigh as much as 3,000 pounds BEST SUITED FOR: Farmwork Brabant Horse The word “Brabant” signifies an area in what is now Belgium, once the duchy of Brabant. It also identifies a particular draft horse that originated in this region. In Europe, “Belgian” is a generic term applied to several slightly different breeds of heavy horse. To confuse Americans further, the Brabant itself goes by various names, depending on the area or country of origin. In southern Belgium it is called the Cheval de Trait Belge. In northern Belgium it is called the Belgisch Trekpaard. In France it is the Cheval Trait du Nord, and in Holland it is the Nederland Trekpaard. Brabants have been imported into the United States since the mid-1800s. They were crossed with local stock to develop the American Belgian, which continued to look very much like the stocky European version until the interruption of horse imports from Europe during the First and Second World Wars.