Base-wide
(cow-hocked).
Fig. 57.
Base-narrow.
Fig. 58.
Base-narrow position
of hind limbs
(bandy-legged).
(b) A hind leg viewed from behind is said to be regular or straight ([Fig. 55]) when a perpendicular line dropped from the tuberosity of the ischium ([see Fig. 1, 9″]) divides the entire limb into inner and outer halves of equal width and touches the ground opposite the median lacuna of the frog. Seen from the side, this line just touches the point of the hock and, passing down at some distance from the flexor tendons, meets the ground considerably back of the heels. A perpendicular line dropped from the hip-joint should pass through the foot, meeting the ground half-way between the point of the toe and the heel ([Fig. 49]). There are base-wide, base-narrow, toe-wide, and toe-narrow deviations in the hind limbs as in the fore-limbs.
The hind limbs are base-wide when they, either as a whole or in part, deviate outward from the normal. The “cow-hocked“ position ([Fig. 56]) is an example of the base-wide; in this case the points of the hocks are too close and turn towards each other, while the feet are widely separated and the toes turned outward. Base-narrow is that position of the hind legs in which either the entire leg deviates to the inner side of the perpendicular ([Fig. 57]), or the leg is about perpendicular down as far as the hock, but below this joint runs downward and inward ([Fig. 58]). In this latter case the hocks may be too far apart, the leg is bent outward at the hock and the animal is termed “bandy-legged,” “bow-legged.”
Viewing a hind limb from the side, it may be observed to deviate either forward or backward from the normal. Among forward deviations is the so-called “sabre-leg“ or “sickle-hock“ ([Fig. 59]), in which the hock-joint is too much flexed, the foot placed too far forward under the body, and the fetlock too slanting. In the position known as “camped behind” ([Fig. 60]) the leg is behind the body and the pastern is too upright, too nearly vertical.