The management and treatment of the horse in the stable, field, and ...

In the Stable, Field, and on the Road. 137
STOMACH STAGGERS.
This complaint, like the former, is often attributable
to acrid substances taken into the stomach when the
animal is in an exhausted state from long-continued
labour. It is most frequently met with in the farm
or cart horse, and is often the result of overfeeding",
especially if the horse is fed upon food of bad
quality. Farmers often resort to the false economy of
selling all their good hay and corn, keeping only the
worst for home consumption, and then are dreadfully
disappointed when they find their stock in an unhealthy
condition, and attribute the cause to everything but
the right, viz,, their own foolish greed, grasping
the shadow and losing the substance. Careless ser-
vants will too often neglect their horses, and after-
wards, when food is placed before them while they
are ravenously hungry, they swallow it rapidily and
in too large a quantity without being properly masti-
cated, consequently it swells in the stomach and stretches
it far beyond its natural capacity; its action bein^
thereby impaired, the brain is unduly acted upon, and
giddiness and drowsiness induced, which occasion
staggering. Too often the horse is kept short of
water while abundance of food is placed before it, and
instead of giving a little water before feeding and a small
quantity of food at first to assist the animal in converting
its food into a pulp and facilitating the operation of diges-
tion, without a judicious quantity of water is given to the
exhausted horse with its food, the stomach becomes gorged
and the natural juices are inadequate to the performance
of their office. It is no uncommon occurrence for farmers