2) ee) ce tis —_— le 4" Van ‘? 5 
SAS REI ei ais Sani MS Ek Nis i Tai ER US ay ia as 
. he - Lay © FE yew / a 
M r : . L, ris a ese mm," ‘J OS eh 
P "4 : , ; vale: ' b: a i ae a “15 : ‘ a ay 
434 REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE. 
a@ considerable extent among people. Still farther east is a strip of 
sandy and swampy country, extremely malarious, and very subject to 
intermittent fever and other diseases of malarial origin. © ' 
Now, if our hogs were dying of unhealthy surroundings; if their dis-: ; i ; 
ease or diseases originate to any exten from malarious emanations, it 
is certainly iu this eastern belt that we should expect to find by far the 
largest percentage of losses. We should not be disappointed in finding 
a few in the central belt, but in the healthy, elevated west, where the — 
hogs roam in vast mountain forests, we should certainly expect an un- — 
usual freedom from disease, especially in summer. Viewing the matter 
from this standpoint, I visited the western and central sections, and — 
would have gone to the seaboard if my own health had not failed me 
at this point. 
Fortunately statistics have been collected of the number of deaths 
among swine in the different parts of the State for the year ending April | | 
1, 1878, and these, as far as can be obtained (twenty-three counties only — 1 : 
out of ninety-four), are as follows: 
/Total number! Number of 
. lrotal number, Number of | . 
Counties. of swine. deaths, | Countics. of swine. | deaths, 
ae ee aoe bE SF 2 A Se Se | ! 
! 5 
' - 
Bene eeu dews res ose aee 22, 286 Peilsi! | MiSNOMe aoe aye ne sae 16 604 3, 853 
Buncombe . .<......-..- 12, 076 3,194 |} McDowell ...-.......-- 6, 011 2, 363 
IBGE e Sosa ant eoanesnmees 6, 341 NO40 ie Nishino see eee 12, 735 3, 670 
Camdemeen os. acactes se 5. 586 S158 Witchellecs. seaes ce seee 8, 972 1,280 
Chatham 27, 858 9)1033)| ender eaee sees semecoee 14, 964 1,977 
Cherokee 5, 183 |} 538) |) OLBOR. == ~<c0cee.-cn-~- 12, 789 3, 084 
@layesetiee: se 4,998 | 1,286 || Richmond . 10, 03 1, 192 
Craven._:... ae 11, 44 3,493 || Robeson... 27,411 3, 754 
Cumberland. we 13, 466 2,006 || Rowan .... aa 14, 409 1, 943 
Currituck ... 7, 064 2,451 ] Wake ive. odbc toes 17, 448 4,112 
Franklin 16, 045 6, 359 || os 
Guiltord: 2652-0525. 222- 22, 392 1, 041 || Total 304, 492 66, 946 
yb sie Aaesuasn eae , 258 888 |i 
el 
That is to say, hogs have died toan alarming extent from Cherokee, 
Mitchell, and Buncombe counties in the mountains, to Camden, Currituck, 
and Craven on the seaboard. Nor was the year above reported an ex- 
ceptional one, as these losses are now being repeated in Haywood and 
Yancy in the west, and from thence in localities eastward to the sea. 
Speaking in round numbers we have reports here from one-fourth of the . 
counties in the State, and these counties in 1870 contained about one- 
fourth of the hogs in the State, and contain now very nearly the same 
number as then. We may, therefore, estimate the losses in the entire 
State at four times the number in these counties, say 260,000. Taking 
the counties mentioned, the loss amounts to 215 per cent. of the whole 
stock, and ranges from 383 per cent. in Camden to only 44 per cent. in 
Guilford. 
ARE THESE LOSSES THE RESULT OF A SINGLE DISEASE? 
This question has been raised again and again, whenever any measure 
has been proposed for diminishing the death-rate of these animals, and 
notwithstanding investigators in widely different localities have observed 
similar symptoms and sinilar post-mortem appearances, the great ob- 
jection to sanitary laws has: always been the uncertainty in regard tothe 
affection or affections from which death eccurred. It, therefore, seemed 
advisable to visit a large part of the State in order to decide this ques- 
tion of primary importance, The disease was seen by the writer in 
Hayweod, Buncombe, and MvcDowell counties, in the mountain district, 
