EEPOET OF THE BUREAU OF ANIMAL INDUSTRY. 175 



cuniary loss. The impoverished condition traceable to it is a small 

 average loss for each animal, but for flocks of over 5,000 sheep ag- 

 gregates thousands of dollars for each ranchman. 



In the article of Dr. Faville, cited above, he quotes a letter * from 

 the late Hon. J. M. Givens, whose flocks numbered from 6,000 to 

 8,000 head. In this letter Mr. Givens states his loss from dead sheep 

 alone for the preceding year at from $3,000 to $4,000. Fortunately 

 the loss of from 400 to 1,100 or more sheep does not occur to flock- 

 masters annually, but such losses are not infrequent, and may be heard 

 of either on this or that ranch during different years. Every ranch- 

 man knows of and appreciates the steady though small loss arising 

 from the depreciated value of his animals, due to their ill condition 

 from various causes, and which he strives by every means to reduce, 

 for therein lie the profits and success of his business. From the study 

 and observation which I have been able to- devote to the tape-worm 

 disease I think ifc alone is responsible for more losses than any other 

 sheep disease on the prairies excepting scab. The direct death-rate 

 traceable to it is large when compared to the entire death-rate, and 

 the indirect loss traceable to it is, though more insidious in its char- 

 acter, still larger, for it is ever present and ever active. 



MEDICINAL TREATMENT. 



Some experiments looking toward the removal of tseniee by medi- 

 cines were made in 1886. Various tsenisefuges were tried with little 

 success. The powdered preparations of ground pumpkin seed, pome- 

 granate-root bark, koosoo, kamala, male fern and worm seed proved 

 of no avail. 



In order that they might be administered cheaply the proper amount 

 of each for ten animals was mixed with meal, bran, and salt, and fed 

 in a trough. When sufficient meal and salt was mixed with the 

 medicines to entice the sheep to eat it, the bulk that contained the 

 requisite dose of medicine was too large for a sheep to eat at once. 

 As this bulk was retained for some hours in the rumen the efficacy 

 of the dose was lost, for the virtue of nearly all of these remedies 

 depends on the dose passing through the intestines in mass. Human 

 patients are usually prepared for the medical treatment by abstain- 

 ing from food for at least twelve hours previously; they are then 

 given a cathartic which is followed by the anthelmintic. This plan 

 of treatment utterly fails in ruminants, for neither stage can be suc- 

 cessfully carried out in administering these remedies by the mouth. 

 The presence of the large rumen, which holds a large quantity of 

 reserve food, and into which new material may be taken, accounts 

 in part for this. Some of the food, if sufficiently fine, in fasting 

 animals passes directly to the manifolds and fourth or true stomach, 

 but a certain proportion would fall into the rumen and thus the 

 efficacy of the total amount acting within a given time would be lost. 



These experiments failed, therefore, through the anatomical struct- 

 ure of the animal and the method of administration. The presence 

 of tseniae in the biliary ducts is another reason why tsenisef uges 



*The letter referred to gives "loco" as a cause of the losses. Before his death 

 the Hon. J. M. Givens had concluded and communicated to his friends of the El 

 Paso Wool Grower's Association, that the loss of this winter was not due to " loco," 

 for the greatest loss had occurred in young sheep and lambs. The latter had not 

 learned to eat " loco" exclusively, were poor, and presented symptoms which he 

 learned later belonged to sheep infested with tape-worms. 



