INTRODUCTION 13 



uistauces, where screw worms do not abound, or where 

 the subjects are somewhat unthrifty, it is best to 

 castrate them during the early summer months. It 

 seems hardly necessary to say that animals should not 

 be exposed to adverse elements immediately after this 

 operation, as exposure to long-continued cold rains 

 tends to lower the vitality, decrease the powers of 

 resistance and enhances the possibility of sequelre. 

 However, the fallacious theory cherished by some, 

 that colts should not be exposed to rain directly 

 after castration, should be emphatically discouraged. 

 Inevitably more harm is done by the well-meaning 

 client who shelters his recently castrated colt in an 

 unsanitary and even filthy stall than can possibly be 

 occasioned by the heaviest downpour of rain, provided 

 the weather is not cold. It has been found impos- 

 sible for a newly castrated colt to assume the normal 

 recumbent position when it is kept in a stable or lit- 

 tered barnyard without causing contamination of the 

 surgical wounds of the scrotum. Postoperative infec- 

 tions have been so caused in many instances, at the 

 expense of the reputation of the acting veterinarian, 

 and it therefore behooves the castrator to insist posi- 

 tively upon having his patient kept away from all 

 barnyard filth until the scrotal wounds have healed 

 completely. 



In castrating normal young animals that are kept 

 under average conditions, no preoperative preparation 

 is urgent. Where general anesthesia is employed in 

 the handling of mature animals, or in the case of 

 nervous stallions, food should be withheld for a suffi- 

 cient length of time to minimize the danger of fer- 

 mentation of ingesta which might be brought on by 

 the attendant excitement. In certain pathological con- 

 ditions where the operation is likely to consume con- 



