30 Williams, Fisher, and Udall: The Spavin Group. 
1893, p. 103) under the title of “Millet Disease in Horses,” in 
which, by feeding millet to horses in North Dakota, mostly 
in close confinement, serious losses were induced, with symp- 
toms and pathologic conditions not separable from rhachitis. 
Food must, in our judgment} be regarded as playing a highly 
essential réle, though in just what manner we cannot assert, 
nor can we wholly separate the question of food from that ‘of 
climate and housing. 
At times it appears that the food acts directly and consti- 
tutes in itself a sufficient cause. We (W.) saw, in Montana, 
in one case some twenty-five or more foals, all showing signs 
of rhachitic affection in the form of spavins, ringbones, etc. 
They were confined on a marshy, alkaline “bottom” pasture, 
where the grass was of a coarse variety. The following year 
the next foal crop, from the same parents, were pastured on 
high foot-hills, and the disease did not recur. 
Herepitry. The spavin group of lamenesses are generally 
said to be hereditary. Sires and dams so affected, whether 
lame or not, and regardless as to whether they ever have been 
lame or not, are excluded from the show ring as breeding stock 
on the ground of hereditary unsoundness. 
Under the head of climate we have already roughly out- 
lined the geographical distribution of the malady, it being prac- 
tically enzodtie in one section and well-nigh unknown in another, : 
though the ancestry of the animals in the two localities is as 
nearly identical as can well be. This speaks strongly against 
heredity. On the other hand, in those parts of the country 
‘ where the affection is common, a diseased mare may raise a 
series of colts, all affected and for generation after generation 
the disease may continue in a given line and on a given farm, 
but we should remember two possibilities, the breeding and the 
farm. If given environments on a breeding farm can cause 
spavin in a mare, there is no known reason why the same con- 
ditions should not produce the same state in her progeny and 
in theirs, generation after generation. When discussing the 
question of food, we related the case of one ranch where this 
affection prevailed when foals were confined in a given pasture, 
but disappeared when the mares were moved to a different char- 
acter of grazing land. Among the foals of a previous season 
from this same farm, was a vigorous, highly bred stallion with 
two enormous spavins on otherwise excellent legs. This animal 
