BUREAU OF ANIMAL INDUSTRY. 523 



GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION OF SOUTHERN CATTLE 



FEVER. 



Much time lias been given to tbc collection of information in regard 

 to the district permanently infected with Sonthern cattle fever, and the 

 )<}marks made in theFirst Annual Report of thisBureau as to tlie method 

 adopted and the difficulties encountered ai)ply equally well to the worlc 

 of the past year. The section that has been investigated during the 

 year is in many parts very sparsely settled; in some portions of it there 

 has been very little movement of cattle, and, cousequentlj', there was 

 very little information to be obtained ; in other parts the continual driv- 

 ing of cattle from the Gulf coast has often made it very hard to dis- 

 criminate between infection brought with these cattle and permanent 

 infection, which may exist for year after year without fresh importation. 

 It is believed that the results given below are as nearly correct as any 

 that can be obtained at present. 



ARKANSAS. 



The unusual obstacles encountered in this State in collecting accurate 

 information made it necessary to have two distinct investigations made 

 across the State hy different inspectors. The facts which they collected, 

 while not in all cases indicating the same conclusion, have supplemented 

 each other to such an extent that the line of the infected district may 

 now be traced with approximate accuracy. 



Beginning at the Mississippi River, it was found that the luitive cattle 

 in Mississippi County became infected by cattle driven in Irom farther 

 south, and died from Southern fever. Mr. W. Burroughs informed Dr. 

 Trumbower that he had purchased cattle in Northeast Arkansas, in the 

 counties of Craighead, Clay, Poinsett, and Greene, and had driven them 

 to Bates and Polk Counties, in Missouri, in the months of July and Au- 

 gust, that he had done this for the past six years, driving as many as 

 five or six herds each year without causing any harm to native ^Missouri 

 cattle. Mr. Reed said, " I don't want any cattle from south of Poinsett 

 County.'- A. T. Martin, of West Plains, Mo., introduced Southern 

 i'ever several years ago with cattle from Jackson County. AV. M. Snm- 

 inors has been dealing in Arkansas cattle since 1874. He has purchased 

 tliem in Poinsett, Craighead, Greene, Clay, Lawrence, independence, 

 Izard, Fulton, Baxter, Randolph, and Jackson Counties, but never knew 

 them to convey the disease to Northern stock. He has never heard of 

 any trouble arising from cattle that came from Mississippi County, Ar- 

 kansas, or from Pemiscot or Dunklin Counties, Missouri. Mr. Moore, 

 a cattle dealer of t4ie same place, said he always had trouble with cattk- 

 that were brought from south of Batesville, Ark. To illusti-ate this, 

 lie said that several years ago he purchased 28 head of cattle o niiics 

 soutli of Bat:esville and drove them home; soon afterwards a nuntlxr 

 of the native cattle sickened and died witli^outhern fever. Dr. Moore, 

 in 18S2, purchased 70 or 80 head of cattle in AVhite County and (liovc 

 them to a range located miles southeast of AVest Plains, Mo. This 

 was in the month of July. He kept them there two weeks and then 

 drove them into Northern Missouri. Soon after he left the range at 

 West Plains, the native cattle died of Southern fever. In Yanudalo and 

 Wittsburg, towns in Cross County, the native cattle still appeared sus- 

 ceptible to the disease. In Saint Francis County, in the vicinity of For- 

 est City and AYheetley, the ranges are x)crmanently infected, and have 



