DISEASES PECULIAR TO BREEDING STOCK, 301 



severe and even fatal straining. As an accessory to the pad 

 and elastic bands may be applied on the umbilicus a liberal 

 amount of melted pitch, or pitch and wax, which will bind 

 the band and skin and still further secure against any descent 

 of the hernia. If by these means the bowels can be pre- 

 vented from descending through the opening the walls of 

 that opening will speedily contract and become fibrous and 

 the possibility of future protrusion will be obviated. 



In cases of longer standing in colts, for example, of sev- 

 eral months old the embryonic cellular tissue around the 

 navel has already been developed into fibrous material, so 

 that the contraction and closure is not so speedy, and in such 

 cases it may be desirable, when the hernia is small, to leave 

 it to nature at least until the colt is one or two years old. 

 In such cases a spontaneous cure often ensues; but the open- 

 ing is rarely so completely effaced, nor so strongly closed, os 

 when effected by bandage immediately after birth. 



The explanation of the spontaneous recovery is this: The 

 lower part of the abdomen in the adult horse is occupied by 

 the large intestines to the utter exclusion of the small. In 

 the young foal these are scarcely larger than the small in- 

 testines and easily protrude through any natural or artificial 

 orifice. As the foal grows, however, and subsists more and 

 more on coarse and solid food, the large intestines gain in 

 size, and in mature life they vary from four to twelve inches 

 in diameter at different points. The blind gut, which is one 

 of the largest, lies obliquely across above the navel, and by 

 its great bulk forms an internal pad, which most effectually 

 shuts off the small intestines from this region. 



"SCOURS" OB DIARRHCEA IN COLTS. 



In all young animals there is a certain amount of secre- 

 tions from the liver, pancreas, stomach and bowels prior to 

 birth, and when the new being comes into the world these 

 products are accumulated in the form of firm, tenacious 

 masses, in the last gut. At first the bowels are torpid, and 

 the stiff, tenacious contents, or meconium, obstructs all prog- 

 ress. The natural laxative, which nature has furnished to 

 clear away this product, is the milk first secreted, and when 



