Commissioner of Agriculture 307 



domesticated varieties. In agricultural districts and with fenced 

 lands this will cover the whole field. Even then, in the warmer 

 season, when stock go to pasture, it must be provided that they 

 are thoroughly excluded from all lands that may be used in com- 

 mon, as are the meres and commons of the Old World, the unused 

 lots in the suburbs of growing cities, the unfenced woodlands north 

 and south, the unenclosed prairies and plains of the West, high- 

 ways, unfenced lands anywhere abandoned as unprofitable or held 

 on speculation, or even cultivated lands that are not securely 

 enclosed. On fenced lands two herds or flocks cannot be allowed 

 to remain on the opposite sides of a single fence, over or through 

 which it is possible to lick or smell each other, where the drainage 

 can wash the products of the one to the lower lands occupied by 

 the other, or where the wind may blow soiled straw, hay or other 

 light product from the one enclosure to the other. Again, no two 

 flocks or herds can be allowed in two nearby pastures where they 

 can drink from the same pond, or from the same running stream 

 by which the infection may be washed down from the one herd to 

 the other. 



When we turn to the wild ruminants, there are many localities 

 in New York, Xew England, Pennsylvania and elsewhere, where 

 deer wander from their natural unfenced woods over agricultural 

 districts in defiance of all barriers, and if these come upon infected 

 ground they carry the disease back to other farms and threaten 

 their own herds and ranges. Under such circumstances the neces- 

 sity for arrest of movement may demand the systematic hunting 

 and destruction of all deer within reach of the infected district. 

 The same remark applies to the antelope, big horn, and other wild 

 ruminants, on the western plains and Rockies. 



In the South, the peccaries would occupy the same role and in 

 case of the introduction of aphthous fever would need to be hunted 

 down or even exterminated in invaded districts. 



FRESH PRODUCTS OK SUSCEPTIBLE ANIMALS 



Hair, wool, bristles, hides, horns, hoofs and other products of 

 susceptible animals must be as rigidly isolated and held, in all 

 infected districts, as the animals that produced them. They may 

 safely be destroyed by binning, or by the action of acids in making 

 manure; they may be deeply buried, or they may be disinfected 



