Bad horse injury.

[msscamp]

msscamp my letter was to mister stepper! he is the feller that asked us the questen. it is my fault fur not putting mister stepper at the start of my letter. when i said son i thought that folks would know who im writen to. you are a lady msscamp i would not call you a son! :roll: i dont see how a lady would think a feller was writen to her when he starts off his letter with son! :roll:

just so you know mister stepper when i said son it was not ment with no disrespect!

My apologies. I honestly thought you were responding to my post. You might be surprised how often that mistake happens - I've never used the word 'son', but I've done it, too. :lol: :lol: :lol:

 

[cypressfarms]

well Only Beef, son, looks like I owe you an apology as well. ;-)

 

[ONLY-BEEF]

msscamp and mister cypressfarms not a problem at all! i can see how comunicateing on this here machine can sure get confusen! cookys wife tells me these days alot of folks dont take kindly to being called son so i aint gonna write it agian ifen i can remember. ;-)

 

[msscamp]

msscamp and mister cypressfarms not a problem at all! i can see how comunicateing on this here machine can sure get confusen!

Thank you.

 

[randiliana]

This post is not going to win me any popularity points, but so be it. Yes, I've seen wounds like that before on horses, many times actually (a few of them ours, most of them someone elses), and - believe it or not - the horse has come through just fine, although with a nasty scar on his/her shoulder. As I understand it, the reason it can't be sutured or stapled is because the action of the shoulder would rip the sutures/staples out and cause even more damage, plus any subsequent infection would not be able to drain. I'm not going to argue that horses should not be penned with barbed wire but, in this area (and I suspect a lot of others as well), horses don't make money - cattle do - and everything is geared towards the cattle. That does not mean I agree with that mentality, simply that it's the reality. Just my thoughts.

I am in agreement with msscamp as well. I have seen injuries similar to this as well, and if it is the shoulder that is affected, it is hard to stitch it because of the movement in that area.

We are also in "cattle country", and it is the rare horse that isn't fenced in barbed wire here. Our horses are often pastured in fields that are 1/4 section or larger, and that are used by the cattle as well. It is not feasable to fence this with horse safe fencing. I certainly agree that barbed wire is not the best way to go with horses, but that is the way it is

SRR mentioned that the owner is not using a sterile method of cleansing the wound, but in my experience the vets often tell you to use a garden hose to wash the wound out. As for the decayed flesh, depending on how bad it is, I certainly wouldn't give up on a horse with that type of injury, I have seen horses that have recovered from some truly HORRENDOUS injuries. We have been fortunate in that we have never had a serious injury yet (knock on wood)

 

[milkmaid]

I've actually heard tell that while wood fencing is probably the best for horses, barbed wire is not the worst. Barbs will rip a horse open, yes, but smooth wire wrapped around a leg will cut to the bone as there's no barbs to stop it from sliding and sawing through flesh and tendons. And that mesh fencing? Also not good. A horse can make a playful paw at the horses in the neighboring pasture, get a hoof caught, and at best come away less one shoe. At worst pull a tendon and be out-of-commission (sp?) for a year... or permanently.

 

[jersey lilly]

Underwoods Horse Medicine.....do a search. It's amazing stuff. Used it when my horse got cut, and to this day we still don't know what he cut himself on. Vet couldn't do a whole lot for him other than clean it out.

Mr Underwood knows what he's doin, get his phone number from his website and make the call.

Here's a few pictures of my horse....From cut date to the last photo was three months. He's fine. Only one shot of pennicillin then used the Underwoods on him.....I won't ever own a horse and NOT have this stuff on hand. EVER!!!!!

The reason it looks so dirty is because this stuff looks about like red lead primer when you spray it on.

 

[Alan]

Milkmaid,

I'm in full agreement with you on the type of fencing and what it does to horses. I think the best type of fence is the electric ribbon.

Jersey,

Great pics and a great example of how well horses can come back from bad looking injuries, thanks.


Alan

 

[ALACOWMAN]

Thats a nasty looking wound but it looks more like a flesh wound than muscle damage. if the muscle is cut into its gonna require surgery not a topical treatment .

 

[jersey lilly]

That chunk of meat you see on the lower side of the wound is the pec muscle. It was completely severed. Chest wounds on horses cannot be sutured, unless its superficial. The movement of walking alone will tear the stitches out, much less if they were to run. It's an area of the horse when injured looks worse than it really is. Since there is such good blood flow to the area they heal relatively well. Normally the pec muscle is only about 1/2 inch thick. you can see in the photo it was about 3 inches thick due to swelling. The swelling doesn't go away for a longggggg time.
Swelling and the oozing liquids you see coming from wounds is their body's natural defense mechanism at work.

 

[ALACOWMAN]

i had a old mare that lunged it to a latch on a ramp load trailor left a gash you could stick your hand into. had to have the muscle sewn up and the hide.had to keep her up a couple weeks. took awhile for it too heal and even longer before she could be ridden........ well i called my ex she said what i was trying too say in my redneck version if the muscle is completely severed into it has too be brought back together or close to each to regenerate new tissue. a muscle can be severed like a fillet and still be connected and regenerate new tissue and heal fine

 

[jersey lilly]

This one wasn't cut like a filet, it was strait across. Vet said he couldn't have cut it any cleaner if he'd took a butcher knife and cut strait across the chest muscle. upper muscle wouldn't come down to meet the lower one at all, he has a dip in his chest now, but has never limped and runs like the wind. Hasn't affected his performance at all.

 

[longhorn314]

A Quarter horse mare of mine had a real bad injury just like that about 8 years ago and the VET luckily could sew it up and it held for about a 10 days or so which really helped and it eventually healed back up and she had a small scar and her chest.But I had to keep her real calm and quiet but they can heal back up depending on the injury.