812 Agricidtural Gazette of N.S.W. [Nov. 2, 1920. 



Atony of the rumen leading to impaction may also occur among well 

 kept cows which are entirely fed on concentrates and chaff without any 

 admixture of hay or long food, and are, at the same time, deprived of grazing. 

 There is no doubt that ruminants, to maintain themselves in a really tit 

 condition,' require a certain amount of rough fibrous material. Lacking the 

 stimulus of this type of food, the digestive organs are apt to become deranged, 

 and impaction results. 



ImjMction of the Omasum. — Generally, this complaint is found following 

 other diseases, but it often occurs as a result of lowered vitality in cattle on 

 dry, innutritious food, when water is. scarce, and, in spring and autumn, when 

 fresh grass is shooting among a lot of dry dead stutt". In all such cases, 

 the condition of this organ is probably due to chronic indigestion and derange- 

 ment of the functions of the system from prolonged dry feeding, and from 

 the change on to green food. Where animals are kept in good tone with 

 regular nutritious feeding, and no other disease is present, the condition is 

 not common. 



Depraved Appetite.— This is a common gccuin-ence among cattle on coastal 

 areas. The aniinals devour bones, sticks, stones, dead rabbits, and all kinds of 

 indigestible rubbish. The causes are many and various, the most important, 

 probably, being an insufficiency of certain mineral matters in the soil (dealt 

 with ^below under the heading Osteomalacia), but other cases occur which 

 may generally be ascribed to indigestion from' some obscure cause. In all 

 cases the essential line of treatment consists in alteration and enrichment 

 of the food supply, change of paddocks, provision of some artificial feeding, 

 and a supply of salt. 



Osteomalacia.— This disease is very generally associated with certain poor 

 types of soils, and is usually shown i)y the bone-chewing habit of the animal. 

 It can best be combated by supplying food fairly rich in mineral salts, such 

 as bran, lucerne chafi^, clover hay, or other suitable artificial foodstuff. In 

 addition, steriUsed bone meal should be added to the food, as much as 2 oz. 

 per day being given at times. Salt is not very often required by such cattle 

 to any great extent, though with all dairy cattle a sui)ply of rock salt is 

 necessary if they show an}- desire for it. 



It will be noted that the great majority of the diseases of cattle which 

 are associated with feeding — a few of which are mentioned above — are really 

 deficiency troubles in some form or other, and this is the main point it is 

 desired to urge in connection with cattle. It is not necessarily bulk weight 

 which is deficient — it may be nutritive constituents. The scrub-fed cattle, 

 which cannot travel without breaking up, the bone-chewing dairy cow of the 

 coast, and the unthrifty pot-bellied youngsters, are all afiected in different 

 ways by some variety of the same thing, and these conditions— and the 

 many other diseases which come more or less directly as sequels to these — 

 can all be prevented by attention to feeding. If grazed continuously and 

 never manured, the natural pastures cannot provide the necessary food 

 material in sufficient quantities during the whole year — certainly not in time 



