Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2017 July 14

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July 14

Why blindfold horses?

Today I saw three horses standing in a field, each wearing a wide band of cloth around the head over the eyes. Why? —Tamfang (talk) 06:19, 14 July 2017 (UTC)

It's not a blindfold. It's fly protection. https://www.statelinetack.com/item/defender-fly-mask/E005909/ 196.213.35.146 (talk) 07:15, 14 July 2017 (UTC)

In a field, that is almost certainly correct, but in other situations horses (and other animals) may indeed be blindfolded. From Blinkers (horse tack):

In the United Kingdom, a bag or cloth blindfold put over the head of a difficult horse while it is being handled (for example loaded into starting gates or mounted) is called a blinder.

Carbon Caryatid (talk) 08:33, 14 July 2017 (UTC)

How many Regional Railroads are there in the U.S. and which ones?

Is the article Regional railroad complete and still current? According to [1], p. 4, there were 21 Regionals in 2014. But the Wikipedia-article lists 34! So what is correct? (not to be confused with "Class II railroads" (if this aticle is correct at all), because they use other criteria, see [2]). Thanks--Semmeringbahn (talk) 12:36, 14 July 2017 (UTC)

The AAR have a series of PDFs which list details on each state, including the Regional Railroads which operate there (e.g., Kansas, which was last updated in February this year). If you have the time, you could check each PDF to check the list and calculate the current total. Warofdreams talk 19:38, 19 July 2017 (UTC)