248 



perisli with slight or excessive tick inoculation and poor 

 care. Fifty to ninety jx^r cent, ol" Northern-bred and im- 

 ported cattle so treated died — a mortality too great to be 

 profitable. A modified form of this careless way has 

 been emploj-ed by many with much more favorable re- 

 sults. The susceptible animals are kept by themselves 

 in barns, pastures and lots separated from native South- 

 ern cattle; at the same tim(» a few ticks are allowed to 

 get on the cattle, but excessive tick infestation is pre- 

 vented. In a majority of such animals tick-inoculation 

 occurs gradually. One summer in the South under 

 such conditions has usually produced immunity. How- 

 ever, losses by this means are too great to recommend it 

 when better means can be obtained. 



Dr. Connoway of the Missouri Experiment Station, 

 and Dr. Francis of the Texas Experiment Station, have 

 tried to control tick inoculation by placing a definite 

 number of young seed ticks upon the suscpetible ani- 

 mals at different times. Collect full grown female ticks 

 from Southern cattle and put them in a fruit jar or 

 some vessel having a little moist earth at the bottom; 

 this jar is then placed in an incubator or in the kitchen 

 near a warm chimney or stove; in 15 to 20 days the 

 female ticks will have deposited their eggs and the eggs 

 will have hatched into a mass of lively seed ticks. About 

 25 of these seed ticks are placed upon each susceptible 

 animal (best time in late fall or in winter) and they will 

 inoculate each animal so that in the course of 10 to 30 

 days the fever will appear. When the animals recover 

 from the mild attack of the fever (say in 40 to 50 days) 

 a larger number (about 100) of incubator seed ticks are 

 put upon each animal; this should produce a second at- 

 tack of fever. When the cattle recover from it they are 

 immune and ready for the pasture. At no time in this 

 treatment should the cattle want for good feed and pro- 



