5 Ne 
422 REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE. 
nam, and Bartholomew. Some of the most intelligent and leading stock 
men of each county were cought, and all the information obtained which — 
they had upon the subject of the disease, both in regard to its present = 
manifestation and past history. Speculators in live hogs and large 
feeders were closely interrogated upon every feature of the disease as 
coming within the range of their experience and observation. Diseased 
herds were visited, and in each case the farm minutely inspected in all 
its bearings upon the health of animals; the methods of breeding, feed- — 
ing, and general management of swine diligently inquired into; dead = 
animals, where not too far advanced in decomposition, dissected, and =~ 
. 
living ones, having the disease, were slaughtered for examination, and ~~ 
the pathological indications carefully noted. The month of September a. 
was entirely devoted to this branch of the investigation. . - 
The object of this method of inquiry was to ascertain whether the ~~ 
disease, as prevailing throughout these several districts, was uniform in 
its character, differing only in such modification in type as may be due iB 
to local influences ; or whether these were to be found separate and dis- 
tinct diseases in different localities, due to entirely different causes for 
their production; and if uniformity was found to exist in the character 
of the disease as now prevailing, to learn from practical and intelligent ~ 
observers in each district whether, in any essential particular, it differs 
from the disease that has prevailed in other years. 
/ 
PREVALENCE OF THE DISEASE. é 
| 
The several districts visited were all more or less affected by the dis- - | 
ease, but to a much less extent than during former years, except, per- is 
haps, in the county of Putnam, where it was prevailing for the first time 
as a general and wide-spread epidemic, the loss being estimated at from ~~ 
fifty to sixty thousand doliars. In this county the surface is sufficiently } 
undulating to produce good drainage; the soil is red clay on limestone. 
Springs of pure limestone water are abundant, and woodlawns beauti- | 
fully swarded with blue grass are seen upon almost every farm. Jeed- | 
ing swine has been an extensive and profitable branch of farm industry | 
in this county, and the herds are, therefore, quite large for a grass-grow- | 
ing section. During the summer months hogs in this county run upon 
blue grass and clover,.and are fed some corn. We found the cornso 
fed often unfit for use, because of a very reprehensible practice of haul- 
ing to the field for convenience in feeding and throwing itin an open - — 
rail pen, where, by exposure to heat and moisture, it soon becomes 
moldy. The mean temperature in this county during the summer was 
slightly above, and the rain-fall considerably below, the average seasons. . 
The counties of Floyd, Harrison, and Washington possess much the 
same kind of soil, and are abundantly supplied with running springs ot 4 
limestone water; but blue grass and clover are not so extensively or ; 
generally grown. In these three counties hog-raising is not a branch ot ; 
farm industry sufficiently remunerative to induce the farmers to gener- 
ally engage in it,and the herds are, therefore, usually small and the, = 
animals very imperfectly cared for. 
The observations made in the counties of Greene, Owen, Monree, Mor- 
gan, and Bartholomew were on a line with the White River Valley. q 
This and the Wabash Valley constitute pre-eminently the hog-growing 4 
sections of Indiana. Jt is in this part of the State that the disease has ~ © 
prevailed to the greatest extent. Hog-raising being the leading busi- 
ness industry, the herds are ordinarily quite large. 
No observations were made in the Wabash country. In the White 
