The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Horse Breeds and Horse Care

by Judith Draper

The definitive guide to horses and horse care! This indispensable book brings together in one volume a comprehensive reference to the world’s main horse breeds and a practical care guide for all horse and pony owners. The first half of the book introduces a round-up of horses and ponies from all over the world, offering a visually stunning guide to the main breeds. The second part of the book opens with advice on buying, bearing in mind riding ability, time available for care and exercise and, most importantly, what activity you hope to pursue—showing, dressage, driving or just riding for fun. In the following chapters, you’ll find expert advice - Different systems for keeping a horse
- All aspects of stable management
- Bedding, feeding, and watering information
- Necessary exercise
- Grooming, including braiding, clipping, shoeing and tack
- Health and basic first aid
- And more! With over 600 photographs, including step-by-step sequences, The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Horse Breeds & Horse Care provides horse owners with invaluable guidance and advice on these fascinating animals.

Genres: Horses, Animals, Nonfiction, Reference, Science

Paperback

First published January 1, 2004

Reviews

[Manybooks · Rating 3 out of 5]

To tell the whole and entire truth, I am both really up and really down with regard to Judith Draper’s 2004 The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Horse Breeds & Horse Care. And honestly, the only reason why I am in fact still considering three stars for The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Horse Breeds & Horse Care is that Draper’s sections on equine evolution and in particular the part of the book where the author features and describes horse and pony care (on buying a horse or a pony, on stabling, feeding, veterinarian and farrier services, on grooming, horseback riding, tack and required safety equipment etc.) are not only wonderfully expansive and very meticulously detailed without becoming textually bogged down, the horse care chapters of The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Horse Breeds & Horse Care also and fortunately very plainly and obviously show just how much time, effort, money and a 24/7 commitment it does or at least should take if you own a horse (any type of horse), if you decide that you want to have your own horse for riding, as a companion animal, as livestock.

For sadly, there are in my humble opinion still far too many individuals who seem to think that owning a horse is nothing special, that this should all be easy and therefore also should not require all that much personal investment with both time and money. And indeed, as someone whose family used to breed Trakehners and was also very much into dressage and show jumping, I can definitely say that horse and pony ownership and care are generally and usually neither simple nor inexpensive. So yes indeed, I thus sure am majorly happy that Judith Draper definitely and clearly demonstrates this in The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Horse Breeds & Horse Care (because it is indeed horrid that horses and ponies are much too often purchased as riding animals, as pets, because someone just really wants to own a horse, but then they do not receive appropriate handling and sustenance due to their new owners not knowing enough about horse care or sometimes not even having the sufficient funds disposable to purchase everything a horse might require, including such essentials as adequate and healthy feed, bedding and paying for a veterinarian if a horse or a pony should become ill).

But although in particular the above described horse and pony ownership and care chapters of The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Horse Breeds & Horse Care are certainly five solid stars for me and equally highly recommended (and especially so if someone is in fact seriously interested in getting, in buying himself or herself a horse or a pony), for me, especially the two sections on horse and pony breeds leave quite a bit to be desired. Because albeit the information presented by Judith Draper on her included breeds is interesting and also seems well enough researched, the lack of a bibliography, of any kind of source acknowledgments in the form of footnotes or endnotes, this sure does make checking and verifying Judith Draper’s narrative for informational correctness almost impossible and also of course means that there is absolutely no supplemental research value with regard to The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Horse Breeds & Horse Care. And combined with the fact that Judith Draper’s included horse and pony breeds are also not really all that all-encompassing, that Draper in my opinion rather ignores far too many breeds, and that the organisation is equally annoyingly confusing since it seems to present kind of a strange mixture of both alphabetical and country of origin criteria, for me, I really cannot and will not consider a higher rating than three stars for The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Horse Breeds & Horse Care (and also think that my three stars is really me being quite generous).

[Zoe · Rating 5 out of 5]

that was a lot of information ( I read the caring part with some of the breeds)

[Ronja · Rating 5 out of 5]

This may just be me but it answered pretty much all of my questions and had lots of cute pictures so that's always a plus

[Beth · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don't really remember if it was AWESOME or not. so yea.