CHARACTERISTICS AND ORIGINS OF THE CLYDESDALE HORSE

The Clydesdale is a breed of heavy draft horse developed in and deriving its name from the district in Scotland where it was founded. The farmers of Lanarkshire, through which the River Clyde flows, evolved its type. The old name for Lanarkshire is Clydesdale.

It was bred to meet not only to meet the agricultural needs of these farmers, but the demands of commerce for the coal fields of Lanarkshire and for all the types of heavy haulage on the streets of Glasgow. The breed thus developed and soon acquired more than a local reputation, and in time, the breed spread throughout the whole of Scotland and northern England.

The district system of hiring stallions was an early feature of Scottish agriculture and did much to standardize and fix the type of the breed. The records of these hiring societies go back in some cases to 1837. The Clydesdale Horse Society was formed in 1877 and has been an active force, not only in Great Britain but also in promoting the breed throughout the world.

The Clydesdale alone of the British breed of heavy draft has enjoyed a steady export trade to all parts of the world. The most active trade has been to commonwealth countries and the United States. Today the Clydesdale is virtually the only draft breed in its native Scotland and New Zealand. It holds a commanding lead in Australia and is popular, though not the numerical leader, in Canada and the United States.

The Clydesdale is a very active horse. He is not bred for action, like the Hackney, but he must have action. However a Clydesdale judge uses the word with a difference. A hackney judge using the word means high-stepping movement, a
Clydesdale judge means high lifting of the feet, not scuffling along, but the foot at every step must be lifted clean off the ground, and the inside of every shoe be made plain to the man standing behind.

As in all breeds of livestock, the Clydesdale has gone through several changes of emphasis over the years, to meet the demands of the times. In the 20’s and 30’s the demand was for a more compact horse; of late, it has been for a taller, hitchier horses. All breeds of draft horses have been through these changes and responded to them in their own way. Throughout all these changes, however, the Clydesdale emphasis on underpinning has remained paramount. Two old Scotch adages illustrate this: “no foot, no horse” and “Tops may go, but bottoms never”

The most common colour in the Clydesdale breed is bay, with brown and black favoured by some. The preferred markings are four white socks, to the knees and hocks and a well-defined blaze or bald face. There are many roans in the breed. The feather is moderate in quantity and fine and silky. The increasing popularity of big hitches has directed more attention to colour in recent years, and I think it fair to state that the stabilization of colour patters (i.e. well defined socks and bald faces, rather than irregular splotches of white over the body) is a major concern, both in Scotland and North America.

For anyone desiring an active yet tractable, intelligent, stylish yet serviceable draft animal the Clydesdale merits his or her most serious consideration.

SHIRE HORSE HISTORY
by Chris Anderson, OakviIIe, Ontario

The wars that brought William the Conqueror to England in 1066, also brought the Great Horse’, whose purpose was to carry knights in heavy armour into battle, from which Shires have evolved. It stands to reason that for horses to carry a fully armoured knight weighing in excess of four hundred pounds into battle, an animal with great strength and yet a calm temperament would be required; two characteristics not lost on today’s Shire.

Whether for use as a ‘Cart Horse’, as they were also known during this period in history, or as a ‘War Horse’, many stallions of large stature were imported to England from the lowlands of Flanders, Holland, and the banks of the Elbe, from 1199 to 1216. It is from this blending, over seven hundred years ago, of these animals with the English breed, that some strains of our heavy draught horses must be said to date their origin.

It was during the reign of Henry VIII that acts to prohibit the breeding of horses under 15 hands were passed, and that the name ‘Shire’ as applied to the horse, was first used in these statutes. The name came from the Saxon word schyran’ that means to shear, or divide, hence the name shire, which is synonymous with county. It is the counties, or ‘shires’, of the Midlands in England, namely Derbyshire, Leicestershire, and Staffordshire, that were home to many of the foremost Shire breeders of their time.

Eventually, the ‘Great Horse’ was no longer needed to carry soldiers. With the advent of gunpowder, armour piercing bullets made the knights of old pass from the battlefield into the history books, and the role of the Shire was changed to pulling freight wagons and coaches.

The importation of heavy horses continued, and in the late 1500’s came the Flanders horse. Known to be the heaviest horse of the sixteenth century, it is most likely the true ancestor of the modern Shire. Along with their importation to England, came the Almaine, or German draught horse, which had good cart potential, but had no lasting influence. The Friesian horse introduced a refining element and a better, freer movement. These three breeds, and in particular the Flanders and Friesian, when mixed with British horses of the time, produced over many years the Shire as we know it today.

The long hair on the lower limbs of the Shire came from the time when Dutch contractors worked on draining the Fenlands in England in the seventeenth century. The fens were marshy swamp land and to clear these areas required massive, wide hoofed animals. The hair, known as feather, down the back of the leg and over the hoof, evolved so that water ran off the foot back to the ground.

The foundation stallion is generally recognized as the Packington Blind Horse, who stood at Packington, near Ashby de Ia Zouche, between 1755 and 1770. He appears in the first Shire Stud Book in England because of the large number of horses claimed to be descended from him.

For the past century Shires have delivered beer daily in the streets of London, pulled barges in the canals, and have performed agricultural tasks on farms in rural England and Wales. Although the Shire is the most popular heavy horse in England, it was extinct in Canada for more than forty years prior to imports in the early 1980’s. There are still less than 300 registered Shires in all of Canada.

Shires are black, brown, bay or grey, usually with a blaze and some white markings on their lower legs. The long hair below their knees and hocks remains a characteristic feature. Mature horses stand 17-lghh and weigh 1700 - 2400 pounds. True to their ancestry, Shires are still known for their strength, athletic ability and docile disposition.

The Shire is presently used for driving pleasure, farm work, and promotional hitches, and has been successfully crossed with thoroughbreds to produce excellent sport horses.