222 REPORT OP THE BUREAU OF ANIMAL INDUSTRY. 



eases. There has been some scab among sheep. Horses and cattle have remained 

 healthy. 



VANDERBURG. Hog cholera, to be noticed as such, first made its appearance in 

 1860, but for several years after there was but very little loss from the disease. In 

 the spring of 1869 over two-thirds of the hogs in the county died with the disease. 

 Your correspondent lost 125 in three weeks; since that time there has been little 

 loss from cholera. Your correspondent has had very good luck with hogs, by giving 

 them plenty of good, clear water, and all the charcoal and ashes they will eat, with 

 once in a while a change of lot or pen. Cleanliness and plenty of wholesome food, 

 with exercise, is about the best preventive of disease. Before our section of the 

 country became thickly settled we had large range, and generally plenty of water. 

 No one ever knew of hogs dying with disease during that time. It is supposed 

 that cholera was introduced in this county by a lot of stock hogs shipped from St. 

 Louis in 1859 and 1860, as no disease was in the neighborhood where the hogs were 

 sold. 



WABASH. I think the first appearance of hog cholera in this county was in 1874. 

 Where it came from I can not now tell, but it gradually grew worse up to 1876, and 

 from that date to this has been almost continuously with us. Sometimes it is in one 

 part of the county, while other localities may not have a case. For instance, last year 

 you could not find one farmer south of the Wabash River but what had some sick 

 hogs. I lost 150 head, large and small. The north side of the river, with a few ex- 

 ceptions, was exempt, while now they are having it bad, wliile we of the south have 

 no cases to report. One year one kind of medicine will do good then the next year 

 it will be of no avail. My own experience has been that we catch it about every 

 three years. We are very careful in every way, but one trouble is, I think, we feed 

 too much corn in the ear. I have lately changed to grinding oats and corn, two of 

 the latter to one of the former, and make a swill and boil it one hour. What I boil 

 to-day I feed to-morrow. 



WASHINGTON. A greater or less number of hogs have died in this county every 

 year for the past thirty-five years. During the past three years the disease has been 

 very general and very fatal. We do not know how it originated. Some of our 

 best farmers; who were breeding pedigreed stock two years ago, have quit the busi- 

 ness on account of the heavy losses sustained in their herds. Some of them lost the 

 results of their labors in breeding up and improving their stock for half a life-time. 

 This is very discouraging to stock breeders, and they are not likely to try their luck 

 again. There 1 are fewer hogs in the county now than for years past, on account of 

 the great scarcity of feed. Stock hogs are now worth $3.50, and but very few are 

 to be had. 



WARRICK. There. has been a limited amount of a disease called " black tongue " 

 among swine during the year in this county, but little complaint of cholera. I 

 can not give the exact date when cholera first made its appearance among swine in 

 this county; but for over twenty years it has made its inroads among them at inter- 

 vals of shorter or longer duration. From the best information I can get, the long- 

 nosed scrubs were healthier than hogs have been since the introduction of the im- 

 proved varieties. 



WAYNE. Hog cholera first made its appearance in our county in the winter of 

 1857-'58. People believed then that only hogs fed on slop from distilleries were 

 liable -to contract the disease. As to the mode of its introduction, no definite theory 

 exists among farmers. Hogs were healthy before the cholera made its appearance. 

 The neighborhood affected by the disease one year has never been affected the fol- 

 lowing year. The disease may be extremely fatal in one locality, while another, 

 immediately adjoining, may be entirely exempt. 



WHITE. The year in which hog cholera was introduced or first appeared in this 

 county is unknown to me. When it now appears it comes unexpectedly seems to 

 arise spontaneously. It prevails much more extensively in the eastern part of the 

 county, which is timbered, than in the western portion, which is prairie. It has 

 never prevailed in this county as a very destructive disease. The writer has raised 

 and fed hogs during the past twenty years, sometimes several hundred at a time, 

 and has never had a case of cholera among them. His plan has always been to keep 

 salt and ashes in troughs of easy access to the hogs, or salt in troughs and coal 

 in abundance. Salt and coal will be daily eaten by the hogs, and in considerable 

 quantities. 



WHITLEY. Hog cholera has been in different parts of our county, but has never 

 spread to any alarming extent. Occasionally a herd gets affected, and in a few 

 cases a number of the herd have died say one-third to one-half but in no case, as 

 I can learn, has it spread to any considerable extent. One man near me had seven 

 die last fall out of a lot of thirty-eight. The disease spread no further, although he 

 had another lot of hogs on the same farm. I know of no remedy or preventive 



