December 2021 Polo Players' Edition- Improvement Needed

Improvement Needed

Lack of Good Ponies Worrying Polo Men

Adapted from Bit & Spur, March 1911

Henry Halff’s Midland, Texas, breeding ranch was one of a few successful poloproducing establishments. Two ponies from this farm were played in the international series and a number were shipped to Europe.

Players ambitious to enter important events have to face the serious proposition of obtaining fast, weight-carrying, well-trained mounts.

That a player is no better than his pony is most certainly true in regard to polo, especially so in these days when games are played at top speed and only great big 14.3 or 15-hand Thoroughbred or three-quarter-bred ponies are considered good enough for really first-class matches.

Men who are ambitious to play in important tournaments in this country have to face the allimportant necessity of obtaining fast, weightcarrying, well-trained ponies. Since polo was first started in 1876, in the states, the solution of this very important problem has been left practically to a handful of dealers who have been fairly successful in providing a good second-class pony. They have been entirely unable to find ponies of international or even first-class quality with the exception of a very few individuals whose prominence in the game was almost entirely due to the player and the thorough schooling these ponies were given after they left the hands of the dealers.

If the dealers were only able to find the material it would not be such a serious matter, but the very small percentage of first-class ponies put on the market is very discouraging. However, taking into consideration their want of knowledge of the game, their lack of opportunity to school their ponies in games of any description, and their lack of capital, it is surprising that they are as successful as they have been in the last 10 years.

Great Deal of Expense

The expense of getting together a bunch of 30 or 40 ponies is very great. In the first place, it means that at least 150 ponies must be purchased originally and after an expensive ‘trying out’ at least two-thirds will be found lacking for one reason or another and not good enough to ship for sale. These undesirable ponies will be sold probably at a loss, in addition to the expense of their keep during the trying-out process.

When the dealer has his string of ponies ready to offer to players he has the terrible expense of keeping them in shape and condition at Eastern rates in most instances. Taking into consideration loss in transit and sick ponies, either eventually unsold or ‘given away’ in an auction, the dealer, with absolutely no exception to my knowledge, makes no more than a hand-to-mouth living out of this branch of the horse business.

Polo is necessarily a rich man’s game and a player should not stop at a stiff but fair price for a high-class pony, because they are very few and far between and are the result of months of ‘looking for’ and buying scores of medium-class ponies. Not only should he give the dealer his price for his pony during the season, but he should not neglect to buy a really first-class pony at any time of the year, as these ponies are invaluable to a man who aspires to play in good company and are not always to be picked up when desired.

There is in England a Polo and Riding Society formed for the purpose of improving and establishing a breed of ponies suitable for polo. Necessarily this meant many years of perseverance and hard endeavor before results could be seen, but it is generally admitted by polo men in England that it has gone a long way toward improving the standard of ponies fit to play, and that in the last few years there have been quite a number of registered, polo-bred ponies played in the most important games. Two of these ponies represented England in the last International Cup games.

England Will Not Sell

A similar society might be formed in the states with good results, but it would be many years before much improvement could be noted and would necessitate the importation of polo stallions, a most expensive and most difficult thing to do, as English breeders would be very chary of parting with these extremely profitable and not easily found ponies.

It was only possible, it will be admitted, to regain the American Cup by the judicious buying of noted English ponies (by English, of course, I include ponies bred in Ireland), but Mr. Whitney or any one else will find it extremely difficult to purchase the same class of pony in England as long as the cup remains in America, or as long as there is any possibility of getting or keeping possession of the cup by the purchase of English-bred ponies. No polo player in England will sell a possible international pony to an American, and no English dealer will dare to risk losing his trade in England by catering to American sportsmen with this issue in view.

Therefore, it is now up to the polo players of America to devise some way to improve the standard of American-bred ponies. Polo players need no instruction as to the type and quality of pony necessary. They are quite alive to the qualifications to be desired, but almost without exception not the slightest attempt has been made by polo men to breed ponies in a systemic manner to produce ponies with substance and speed at about the regulation height.

As a matter of fact, the only possible method at the present time is to breed a Thoroughbred stallion to a polo pony mare, but a very large percentage of the ‘get’ is over height, and only a small percentage of the foals that are of the right size have the disposition and conformation to become polo ponies.

Establishing A Breeding Farm

The game is becoming more popular every year and it is absolutely necessary for a few men who have the sport at heart to get together and establish a breeding farm for the purpose of improving the breed of polo ponies. It will be more or less of an expensive undertaking for a few years, but the only alternative is that the players of this country will have to rely upon England and Ireland for their best ponies.

To establish such an undertaking would require half a dozen stallions of the desired polo type, and a few hundred acres in Virginia, for instance. There would be no difficulty in getting a good selection of mares for breeding purposes. Every polo man in this country would be only too glad to sell or even offer his mare ponies for such a purpose after they have fulfilled their usefulness on the polo field. Numbers of polo ponies that have, through accidents or for other reasons, been thrown on the markets to become wasted on the streets in hucksters’ wagons and so forth, might be utilized for experimental breeding.

Eventually it would be possible to breed almost to a certainty the type of pony desired, but in the meantime even the ponies that proved oversize or under-fitted to become polo ponies for one reason or another, could be sold at a profit as park or hack ponies. Those that proved to be of the right material would be offered for sale in the same manner as would the stock of any horse dealer.

The principle of the organization would not be to breed ponies solely for the use of the instigators, but on such a large scale that a great number of players would find it possible to replenish their stables from this source.