146 



The Country Gentleman's Magazine 



%\it Itteriitman. 



SCOUR IN SHEEP. 



By C. W. Sutton. 



THE affections we are considering have 

 their habitation mostly in the intesti- 

 nal canal, and their rise in the material which 

 may be taken into it, which, if of an irritating 

 nature, will set up a faulty action when it 

 comes in contact with the highly sensitive 

 lining membrane of this canal, and this may 

 also be produced by causes not acting directly 

 upon the intestinal canal, as we shall see pre- 

 sently. It is very important to be able to 

 distinguish and separate one cause of diarrhoea 

 from another, and to discover whether that 

 cause is acting directly or indirectly on the 

 intestinal canal. And I find nineteen out of 

 twenty believe that it always arises from some- 

 thing that disagrees with the digestive organs, 

 and treat them accordingly, changing their 

 food, giving corn or cake, but all has been 

 done without good resulting ; and what is 

 the reason of this ? Simply because the 

 symptoms were not understood, and thus 

 they have gone on treating their flock in 

 perfect blindness. I wish, therefore, to call 

 your attention to the fact that although 

 diarrhoea or scour may (to the casual observ- 

 er) be the prominent symptom, yet it is the 

 result of several causes, such as the effect of 

 simple irritants, improper food inferior in 

 quality, rank or wet and sloppy grass, the 

 action of Filaria bronchialis, commonly known 

 as worms in the throat; worms in the intes- 

 tines, &c. 



I have frequently known great losses 

 amongst sheep when first put upon swedes, 

 and especially if the roots are in a rapidly 

 growing condition, — and why? They are 

 unripe : the starch has not been converted 



• Read before the Stovmarket Farmers' Club. 



into sugar, the nitrogenous matter they con- 

 tained was not in a healthy form, and so irri- 

 tated the bowels and produced scour ; and 

 the plan I have known some good practical 

 men adopt, of lifting the roots, causes part of 

 the water to evaporate, and render them less 

 liable to disagree. It should be our endea- 

 vour, whilst attempting to make the most of 

 our flocks, to keep them as closely as we are 

 able to a natural state. Unfortunately, the 

 higher land is farmed, proportionately so do 

 we diverge from the natural to the artificial 

 state, and the more difiicult it becomes to 

 rear lambs ; for keep they may be thoroughly 

 adapted to fatting sheep, which may be re- 

 folded several times upon the same land 

 during the year, would be highly injurious to 

 a breeding flock, and, in all probability, cause 

 great loss amongst it' by the too succulent 

 character of the root crops, or the too luxuri- 

 ant growth of grass upsetting the delicate di- 

 gestive process of the lambs, directly by the 

 food they consume, or the ewes' milk being 

 too rich in quality, either of which may pro- 

 duce scour. 



In diarrhoea produced by these causes, I 

 would adopt the following treatment : — First, 

 a change of keep, substituting cut hay, straw, 

 straw peas, corn, or bran for some of the 

 diet they had been consuming. Nature is 

 adopting her own method of cure ; there- 

 fore, do not be in too great a hurry to ad- 

 minister anything to arrest the discharge; 

 but if the diarrhoea is prolonged after the 

 change in keep has been carried out, give 

 something to assist nature in carrying off the 

 offending matter, for which purpose give to 

 each sheep, linseed oil, 2 or 3 o.z. ; opium 

 powdered, 5 grains, or a teaspoonfvil of laud- 



