Horses and riding . popularly said to be two sorts of spavins ;a bog or blood spavin, and a bone spavin, but I tbinkthat there are two distinct species of bone spavinsdiffering from each other. I will first describe the bone spavin, as it is themost common and the mostinjurious. Standing then in/ front of the horse, and look-ing between his fore legs,the hind legs will look some-thing like what I havedrawn in the figure. If thehocks are well formed andfree from unsoundness, theoutline will go down the legto the fetlock without anyexcrescence or lump; if thehock is spavined there w^illbe an exc
Horses and riding . popularly said to be two sorts of spavins ;a bog or blood spavin, and a bone spavin, but I tbinkthat there are two distinct species of bone spavinsdiffering from each other. I will first describe the bone spavin, as it is themost common and the mostinjurious. Standing then in/ front of the horse, and look-ing between his fore legs,the hind legs will look some-thing like what I havedrawn in the figure. If thehocks are well formed andfree from unsoundness, theoutline will go down the legto the fetlock without anyexcrescence or lump; if thehock is spavined there w^illbe an excrescence where Ihave drawn it at a, one ofthe figures representing ahock with the larger sortof bone spavin, and the other with the smaller larger one is easier to detect in this positionthan the smaller one. I cannot describe it better than by saying it looksas if someone had taken half a walnut shell, andinserted it under the skin in that place; sometimesit is much bigger than that, and about the size of a. COMMON UNSOUNDNESSES. 165 tablespoon, and in this case it is not quite so easyto be certain about it. Some horses with large coarse bony strong hockshave a formation there which very much resemblesa bone spavin, though it is quite a natural forma-tion, and does not imply unsoundness. If the horsehas one hock larger than the other it is a spavin,but if they are both exactly alike it may be thenatural formation of the hock, or it may be that thehorse has a bone spavin in each leg. Nothing butpractice, and being acquainted with the shape of horseshocks, will enable anyone to distinguish betweenthese two, and it is difficult to describe it on paper. The second sort of bone spavin I have mentionedis a different enlargement, and occurs in a differentplace; it is very near where the other is, but slightlymore in front of the leg, and is more like a hazel-nutin shape and size. The best way of detecting thisspavin is by running your hand gently down the in-side of the horse
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