Hock Knot

As noted earlier in a post, one of our horses, Journey, had a mysterious lump on his right rear hock. The military vet cut it open about two months ago to see what it was and take a biopsy sample. She contemplated trying to cut it out but wisely decided not to and closed the wound up again. The biopsy revealed that the lump was some kind of scar tissue. Unfortunately, the wound would not heal and the lump continued to get bigger. Alarmed by this we decided to take Journey in for surgery at Arizona Equine in Gilbert last Monday. It is a three hour drive to get up there and we had to make it twice since we had to leave Journey overnight. Getting the funding took some effort too. The clinic, knowing that we don't have much money, agreed to do the surgery for no more than $2,000. I didn't have that much in our budget so I asked our military vet clinic to pay $500, took $500 out of our own budget, and asked the Army to give me an additional $1,000. Everybody paid up, so I didn't have to go to the Fort Huachuca Cavalry Association for more money. Having just spent $1,400 of FHCA money on Charlie and Bob, I didn't want to hit them up for more. The surgery seems to have been a complete success and Journey is recovering nicely. We kept the mysterious lump (pictured here--yuck) so we could have another biopsy done. The lump was about the size of half an apple. The dark oblong circle at the top of it is where the previous surgery had taken place and obviously a slice was taken out of the middle for the biopsy. It is big, ugly, hard, and had hair growing on it. Until the biopsy is done we won't know what caused it and we may never know. Our current theory is that Journey had a thorn stuck in the joint from years ago when his trooper at the time rode him into a cactus at Picacho Peak. The thorn may have been encapsulated but became irritated during a subsequent injury to the hock--most likely a kick from another horse--and then began to grow. All we know for sure is that the lump was caused by some previous injury. Hopefully the biopsy will solve the mystery. Meanwhile, Journey will be down for at least a month for post op care and reconditioning.