I had a time with a cut over Hope's right eye last summer. She must've whacked in on something pretty good because in addition to the gash, she had a huge knot on her head for a couple of months. I didn't see it for probably 24 hours since I can only get out there to feed once a day, so it was too late to stitch. It looked really deep, but alot of it may have been the swelling. I doctored it as best I could, but it got infected and festered something awful. I had to scrub the crud off of it every afternoon, then irrigate it with a solution of betadine, epsom salt and pickling salt in hot water in a syringe. It took forever to heal, and I thought it'd leave a horrible scar, but it didn't. You might could find it if you shaved her head, but you sure can't see it otherwise. I was really supprised. Maybe it was because she was only 2mths old.
I've been amazed how well horses do heal without scarring.
I've seen 2 incidents where I would have thought there was going to be a big scar.
A friend of mine had a pony that just about decapitated herself on a piece of tin. You could see in that cut clear to what ever it is that is in their necks. Stick your whole hand in it and down inside. It was really gross, and couldn't be stitched because of the location. She doctored it every day, cleaned it out and used Cut Heal. It healed fast, and left no decernible scar.
Dot got run thru a fence one time when she was about 2. She got a cut where her front leg conneted to her body. It was big and unlike the cut on that pony, her cut was jagged, flaps of hide hanging. It took longer to heal, couldn't be stitched either. It was gross too. It swelled real bad. As it started to heal, with every step she took the yellowish gunk bubbled out. YOu could hear it. I took her to the vet because I thought it was infected and he said that that drainage was good, it was the fluid from the swelling coming out. You can see no scar now on her either. We doctored that with Cut Heal. That's about the only thing I use on cuts. It's kind of messy stuff, but I think it really works.
Becky
Wounds like that often don't scar which is nice, foals seem to be accidents waiting to happen.
All puncture wounds you want to leave open, not suture because they need to heal from the inside out. You do need to keep them open, as you did with scrubbing and flushing, otherwise the top heals and infection often developes inside.