650 Journal of the Department op Agriculture. 



to disappear, and the animals returned to normal condition. There 

 is no doubt if this treatment were kept up it would not be lono- before 

 the ticks were so reduced as to be of little account. 



PRECAUTIONS NeC:ESS.\RY. 



Farmers bringing cattle from a known ear-tick area to a clean 

 district should have all animals hand-dressed immediately before 

 leaving, whether ticks are evident or not, and in case some ticks may 

 still be present on arrival at their destination it would be advisable 

 to hand-dress again at least once and to keep the animals under 

 observation for a week or two. A great risk of introducing- this tick 

 to a clean area lies in the fact that the tick may Cjuite commonly be 

 present and its presen(;e impossible to detect. Apparently clean ears 

 are no guarantee that tick^ are not present. 



Comments by C. P. Lounsbury. 



The writer of the foregoing article, Mr. Colin Story, is a graduate 

 of the Elsenburg School of x4.griculture. and was an officer oi the 

 Department of Agriculture for a number of years before he took up 

 farming about 1906. When with th^^ Department he was concerned 

 with stock dipping experiments for the destruction of ticks, and in 

 the years that have intervened he has maintained his old interest in 

 ticks. It was therefore but natural that when considerations for 

 health necessitated his leading a rather inactive outdoor life in the 

 Aliwal North District for several months he should divert himself 

 with a study of the ear-tick, a species new in his experience. He had 

 no account of the tick by any previous student to influence his observa- 

 tions, and hence his conclusions are quite unbiassed and those of a 

 practical farmer with an unusually sound general knowledge of ticks. 

 Later he received from me a copy of Mr. G. A. IT. Bedford's paper 

 which was published as Local Series Bulletin Xo. 18 of the Depart- 

 ment of Agriculture. Believing that a simple, straight forward 

 article on the ear-tick, such as he would write, would find particular 

 favour with the ^farmers of the country who have the misforiune to 

 have the tick on their stock. I urged Mr. Story to write up his observa- 

 tions and get them ])ublished in the Fanner'' >i Weekly. He acted on 

 my advice, and now, with his permission, the article is here repro- 

 duced. The opportunity is taken to offer a few couiments and to 

 draw attention to points on which Mr. Story's observations are not 

 fullv in accord with the statements given in the leading American 

 account of the tick (IT.S.D.A. Bur. Ent. Bull. 106). 



Relation to Other Kinds of Tichs. — The common stock-infesting 

 ticks, that is the bont, liont-leg, blue, red, brown. Cape brown, black- 

 pitted, and russet ticks, are all J^mclid ticks, and have many features 

 in common not found in the spinose ear-tick. The latter is an Argasid 

 tick along with the true tampan that attacks man, the fowl-tick (often 

 called tampan), the bat-tick, and the penguin-tick. The Argasid 

 ticks all lack the firm, non-stretching '' "shield " present on the back 



