644 Journal of Agncidtiire. [8 Nov., 1907. 



tissue, and so form an open wound with healthy tissue surfaces, which 

 may be treated in the ordinary way. It may be necessary to make an 

 opening through the horn, either of the sole or wall, to meet the wound 

 made by the excision superiorly, so that efficient drainage may be insured. 

 Care must be taken in performing the operation that the coronary band is 

 not cut away ; as if this is done, there will be no subsequent formation of 

 wall horn. 



FOOTROT IN SHEEP. 



Nature of the Disease. 



After nearly a centurv of discussion, experimentation, and investiga- 

 tion engaged in by a host of world-renowned scientific and practical men, 

 the conclusion has now been arrived at that there are three forms of foot- 

 rot, viz. : — (i) Simple footrot, the ordinary widespread non-contagious 

 form; (2) contagious foot eczema, or eczema epizootica, the "mal de pied'' 

 of the French ; and (3) infiammation of the inter digital duct. Such a con- 

 clusion is satisfactory, and may be taken as settling the question of the 

 contagiousness or non-contagiousness of footrot, about which so much con- 

 troversy has centred. It seemed inexplicable that such keen observers as 

 Youatt and Fleming, on the one hand, should pin their faith to its con- 

 tagiousness, and that equally shrewd and experienced investigators like 

 Dick and Williams should be convinced of its non-contagiousness. The 

 former were swayed largely by their knowledge of the evidence of the 

 contagiousness of a similar disease in France, where it is now known that 

 contagious eczema of the feet of sheep, sO' closely identical in its symptoms 

 and effects with simple footrot, is verv rampant. The issue was cloudeil 

 somewhat by the fact that sheep suffer sometimes from the " foot and 

 mouth disease " of cattle, and doubtless at times this extremely contagious 

 disease was mistaken for footrot. The first correct note, as foreshadowing 

 a reconciliation of the diverse views that were held, was struck by Spooner, 

 who considered the opinion that the disease was always, or even generally, 

 contagious to be undoubtedly erroneous, but who stated his conviction that 

 some outbreaks that he had experience of could not be explained other- 

 wise than by contagion. Later on. Brown, who followed by researches 

 which established the fact of the contagious nature of one form of disease, 

 stated that this virulent form of footrot, recognised generallv on the 

 continents of Europe and America, was not often observed in England. 

 Hogg, the Ettrick shepherd, when he recorded that he had known simple 

 driving of a flock o\er a particular farm cause footrot in the flock, must 

 have encountered the contagious eczema and mistaken it for simple 

 footrot. 



Similarly, it is likely that those outbreaks of so-called footrot which have 

 been recorded at different times in Australia — particularly the Queensland 

 outbreaks in the early nineties — and of which there is abundant proof of 

 contagiousness, were in reality a visitation of the contagious foot eczema, 

 which is closely allied to the contagious " foot and mouth disease " of 

 cattle, but which possesses anatomical and other features whereby it may 

 be comparatively easily distinguished from the more common and ordinary 

 kind of footrot that is the bane of some localities in all seasons, and of 

 additional localities in some seasons. It will be seen later that it is only 

 in the first stages that the two diseases can be accurately distinguished, 

 and that when established the lesions produced are practically alike. 



