Swelling above knee

[Anna Clara]

Does anyone know what this swelling might be on the outside of a leg? It doesn't seem warm or painful and pony is not lame although haven't trotted any circles recently...we just hack very lightly at home or do gentle walk lateral work in the field. It came up about a week ago, I cold hosed and gave a couple of days of bute in case it was sore. He had a scrape higher up the same leg at the same time so not sure if related. I'm worried about it being something musculature related that will need more help to heal. Its probably gone down slightly over the days and since I took pic but still there.

I'll be honest, I've not got much trust in my vets at the moment who seem to be on a make as much money outof insurance mission instead of doing what's right for the pony, which isn't ideal. I know that if I call them they will say bring in for a work up and I'm not sure i need to jump straight to that.

 

[Carrottom]

Would your vet look at the picture?
If there is no heat and pony not lame I would just monitor it for now.

 

[Anna Clara]

Would your vet look at the picture?
If there is no heat and pony not lame I would just monitor it for now.

Will try, I had to beg them to come out and see a pony that I didn't think was quite right, all they wanted was me to bring him in for full work up. £300 later I still had no answers. £60 with the osteopath and we were sorted....

 

[Orangehorse]

OK, its just a photograph and I don't know the history of your pony, so this might be wildly not applicable to you. But .......

This is with hindsight and maybe I wouldn't have gone down this route with what I know now, but this was years ago.
My horse had not terribly good front leg conformation if you looked carefully, including slightly pigeon toes We did quite a lot of showing and the recommended farrier was very clever and shod him so that at first glance he looked OK, just about. I'm not saying that he did anything drastic, but the horse was presented as well as possible, let's say. After a couple of years I would watch him walking round the field and thought that something wasn't quite right. I even got the vet and farrier out together and was leading him round and round while they looked and discussed and decided there was nothing wrong at all.

A few months after this one day I looked at him and noticed A LUMP JUST ABOVE HIS KNEE on the outside. I got the vet who thought it must be a knock and was told just to wait and it would go down. At the same time he was getting a bit clumsy on his feet so one autumn I decided to have his shoes taken off to rest his feet. I don't know when, but a bit later I noticed that the lump had gone. His feet altered drastically too, the pigeon-toes improved a lot. In barefoot parlance he grew the foot he needed.

The lump never came back. I did eventually have his shoes put back on, a different farrier and the lump never re-appeared.
I decided that as he was being shod for appearance there must have been a bit of a torque or strain on the knee. If I had had his shoes removed to rest during the winter, say, it might never have happened but we tend to ride and compete all year round now.

 

[Cazza525]

It’s a hygroma, my horse has 2. It’s basically like a wingall. Doesn’t hurt them but never go down