CONTAGIOUS DISEASES OF DOMESTICATED ANIMALS. 417 



except such as is freshly drawn from a well. If this is complied with, 

 and if all communication whatever with any diseased hogs or pigs is cut- 

 off in every respect, which is absolutely necessary, and still danger 

 should be anticipated, for instance, if one or more animals should have 

 become infected before the herd was removed, or a possibility of either 

 food or water for drinking being or becoming tainted with the infectious 

 principle should exist, the danger may be averted, or at least be very 

 much diminished by administering three times a day in the water for 

 drinking eitlier some carbolic acid (about ten droj^s each time for every 

 150 pounds of live- weight), or some hyposulphite of soda (a tea spoonful 

 for every 100 pounds of live-weight), till all danger has disappeared. 

 Second, wheie swine plague has been allowed to make some progress 

 in the herd, or where the presence of the disease is not discovered until 

 severa-l animals have been taken sick or have died, others have become 

 infected, the best that can be done is to separate at once the healthy 

 animals from the diseased and suspected ones ; to place the healthy ani- 

 mals by themselves and the doubtful ones by themselves 5 to separate, 

 disinfect, and ti-eat the animals in the way just stated. Special care 

 must be taken to i)revent any communication, direct or indirect, between 

 the three different parts of the herd. If one i>erson has to do the feed- 

 ing, &c., he must make it a strict rule to attend always first to the 

 healthy animals, then to those considered as doubtful, and last to the 

 sick ones, and must never reverse that rule, or go among the healthy 

 hogs or pigs after he has been in the yard or pen occupied by the others. 

 If possible each portion of the herd should have its own attendant, who 

 should not come in contact with any of the others. The separation must 

 be a strict one in every respect ; even dogs and other animals may carry 

 the infectious principle from the diseased animals or from the yard occu- 

 pied by them to the healthy hogs and pigs. Buckets, pails, &c., which 

 are used in feeding the sick hogs should not be used for the healthy 

 ones, because the infectious princii)le may be conveyed by them from 

 one place to another. Last but not least, it is very essential that the 

 yaid or hog-lot occupied by the healthy portion of the herd be higher 

 than that occupied by the others. If it is lower, and especially if it is 

 so situated that water and other liquids from the other hog-lots can 

 flow into it, or over it, the separation is worse ttian useless, for then the 

 healthy portion of the herd will surely become infected unless the ground 

 is exceedingly dry. Third, whenever swine plague is prevailing in the 

 neighborhood, any operation, such as ringing, marking by wounding, or 

 cutting ears or tail, and castration and spaying particularly, must not 

 be performed, but should be delayed until the disease has disappeared, 

 or does not exist anywhere within a radius of two miles. If such opera- 

 tion should become absolutely necessary, the wounds must be dressed 

 at least once a day with an effective disinfectant, for instance, with a 

 solution of carbolic acid or thymol, till a healing has been effected. 



2. Swine plague is very often communicated from herd to herd and 

 from place to place by a careless, and, in some cases, even criminal con- 

 tamination of running streamlets, creeks, and rivers with the excre- 

 ments and other excretions of diseased hogs and pigs, and with the car- 

 casses and parts of the carcasses of the dead animals. This source of 

 the spreading of the disease can be stopped only by declaring such con- 

 tamination of streamlets a nuisance and making the offense punishable 

 by law. Allowing swine affected with the plague to have access to 

 such streamlets should be considered as constituting good evidence of 

 euch a contamination, as also the throwing of dead hogs, or parts of a 

 carcass, into such streamlets, creeks, or rivers. 

 27 AG 



