Cattle 1853 - Lewis Family Farm

380 CATTLK.
calculus and the urethra are less likely to roll under the knife, and
the wound will more readily heal. One or two sutures should be
passed through the edges of the wound, which will speedily adhere.
The operation is simple, but the danger of neglect is great ; and
many a beast has been lost by the bladder being distended, and
continuing so until violent inflammation of its mucous coat has taken
place, or it has been ruptured.
Should not the calculus be in this anterior portion of the urethra,
that between the scrotum and the anus should be carefully examined
and if it be not found there, it is imprisoned somewhere in the inverted
£ curve. An incision must then be made anteriorly to the scrotum,
in the manner already described ; the penis drawn out ; the curve for
a while obliterated ; the situation of the obstruction discovered ; the
urethra laid open at that point, and the calculus extracted.
Some veterinarians have remarked, that oxen are most subject to
the formation of these calculi during the autumn and winter ; and
that, as the spring advances, the new grass produces a more abundant
secretion of urine, and thus relaxes the urinary organs, and
enables the calculi more easily to pass ;' while the fresh herbage gives
an alkaline and soapy character to the urine, which causes some of
the recently formed calculi to be dissolved in the bladder.
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