250 GRAZING CATTLE DISEASES 



Symptoms. The temperature rises ; the urine, which is 

 increased in quantity, is red in colour ; constipation sets in, and 

 is sometimes followed by diarrhoea. The animals have a poor 

 and unthrifty appearance; they totter as they walk, and appear 

 weak in the loins ; the membranes are unnaturally pale, and 

 anaemia is marked. 



Besides the acute form, which runs its course in a few 

 days and is seldom fatal, there is also a chronic and usually 

 fatal form, with similar symptoms ; but there is no fever, and 

 the red coloration of urine is often intermittent. 



Treatment. Adminster a purgative, preferably Glauber's 

 salts, sodium sulphate (at one time much more used than 

 Epsom salts in cattle practice), and give good, nourishing, 

 easily digested food, such as eggs, followed by linseed cake or 

 cotton cake, when the animals are convalescent, and, as a tonic, 

 two teaspoonfuls each of sulphate of iron and powdered gentian. 



Preventive means are, keeping cattle out of woodlands 

 that are liable to produce red-water, draining poor wet land, 

 and improving the quality of the pasture by the use of 10 

 cwts. per acre of slag phosphate on damp places, or 6 to 8 

 cwts. of steamed bone flour on dry land. 



Leaflet No. 63 of the Department of Agriculture and 

 Technical Instruction for Ireland connects one form of the 

 disease with the bite of the common tick, which introduces 

 a parasitic organism into the blood that destroys the red 

 corpuscles. It is the discharge of the remains of the corpuscles 

 thrown off by the kidneys which gives the characteristic 

 colour to the urine of affected animals. The colour is usually 

 dark, " varying from light red to chocolate, or even approach- 

 ing black." Healthy ticks are thought to be able to carry 

 the disease from an affected animal to a sound one. The 

 great means of prevention is to remove the natural shelter for 

 the tick, such as clumps of bushes and rough herbage. Taking 

 a crop of hay and closely grazing the aftermath, or the 

 cropping of arable land, is found to be a useful means of 

 prevention. Top dressing with 3 tons of lime and 10 cwts. of 

 crushed rock salt per acre has also been found useful, In 

 treatment the great object is to stop the rapid wasting, and 

 to build up strength by careful nursing, and by giving " well 

 boiled oatmeal gruel, boiled flax-seed, and even milk, eggs, 

 ale, and stout." 



