REPORT OF THE BUEEAU OF ANIMAL USTDUSTRY. 289 



HENDERSON. Hog cholera, from the best information that I can get, made its 

 first appearance in 1874. Anterior to that time this county was noted for its vast 

 and cheap hog production, most seldom failing; the meat was made entirely in the 

 woods, costing nothing but the labor of killing and cleaning. A dead hog before that 

 time was a rare occurrence, but now hogs are very scarce, and the people are slow to 

 attempt raising them. One reason is, that the range hogs' time is nearly ended, and 

 another is that the cholera or something else is so sure to visit us that it keeps peo- 

 ple from trying the hog industry. Of the cause of its introduction we know but 

 little. Some wiseacre attributes it to the introduction of the blooded hogs. 



HILL. We have no hog cholera. Hogs are remarkably healthy. During my 

 residence here of eighteen years I have never witnessed anything like cholera, ex- 

 cept two years ago, at a beef pen near here. The hogs (which were driven in from 

 the West to fatten with cattle) were affected with something like cholera, but it did 

 not spread from that herd and disappeared with it. About 50 per cent, of them 

 died ; the remaining ones got well and fattened. There were about 250 of them. 

 Hogs or pigs sometimes die from eating cotton seed and also from eating cockle 

 burrs, The only disease among horses is what some term "Mexican glanders," 

 but it is very rare. It is more fatal to mules than to horses. I have not known a 

 case the past year. Cattle and hogs are free from disease. Sheep are subject to scab 

 when neglected. 



HOPKINS. I can obtain no information whatever as to the date of the introduction 

 of hog cholera into this county, or the means of its introduction. One of my as- 

 sistants, a native, says he knows nothing about it. He says : "It is a prevailing 

 opinion, when any disease gets among our hogs and decimates them, that it is hog 

 cholera, and well enough, I reckon, for they die all the same." I have seen great 

 numbers of hogs that were said to have died of cholera. I knew they starved to 

 death. I have known many hogs in good order to die ; they had plenty of acorns 

 but no water. A neighbor turned a large number of fine hogs into a pea field and 

 left them there. They all died; he said they died of cholera. Many have died in 

 the fattening pens when nearly ready to kill fed exclusiveryon corn. I have never 

 lost a hog by cholera or any other disease. I give a little salt, some sulphur, burnt 

 bones, and plenty of charcoal; feed weeds, vegetables, slops, oats, and corn. Still 

 there is sometimes an epidemic among the hogs, because in a neighborhood nearly 

 all the hogs will die, no matter how they are cared for. The rule here is, no feed 

 most of the time, and all corn when they do feed. I estimate that 1 per cent, of 

 cattle die of disease, generally dry murrain, caused by want of water in summer 

 when the feed is dry. There are no prevailing diseases among cattle. As I formerly 

 reported to the Department, 95 per cent, of the cattle that die die of starvation. 

 Hundreds of them are getting ready to die now just waiting for the " heel-fly." 

 Sheep are but little affected by any disease except scab, of which but few die. 

 Neglect is what gets away with most of them. Last August and September I esti- 

 mated that 1,000 head of sheep died of some unknown disease. I attributed it to 

 drinking filthy water, the wash of the range collected in pools in the creeks. The 

 blood of all I examined was thick and black. Before death there was no indication 

 of disease. Nearly all died during the night. 



HOOD. Hog cholera has an unlimited class of symptoms. Every dead hog found 

 is said to have died with cholera. I came here in 1869 and heard of cholera then. 

 Empty cribs caused a majority of the deaths in the hog family. Some few fat meat 

 hogs have died with cholera recently. We know no cause, neither can the oldest 

 settler tell me when the disease first made its appearance. The Indians who raided 

 through this county in 1869 spoke of a disease resembling cholera many years pre- 

 vious. Filth and poverty are the causes in most cases of cholera. A few cases of 

 staggers among horses are reported. Profuse bleeding in neck relieved most of 

 them. That has proven an unfailing remedy so far as I have tried or heard of its 

 being tried. A small proportion of young cattle are always affected in the early 

 spring with what we call black leg, unless wood ashes are freely used when salting. 

 That will prevent it. Some herds of sheep have been badly affected with scab, 

 caused by neglect. 



HOUSTON. The first appearance of hog cholera that I remember was in the winter 

 of 1862-'63, and was more fatal then than it has ever been since, unless this year has 

 the precedence. As near as I can estimate, about two-thirds of the hogs that were 

 in the county January 1, 1887, have died from the disease called cholera. I am sat- 

 isfied that parasites have a great deal to do with the disease of hogs, such as kidney 

 worms and worms in the bowels. Hogs die very often here from lung disease, simi- 

 lar to pneumonia in people, which is mostly caused by them sleeping under houses 

 where there is much dust, which the hog takes into liis lungs in breathing. 



JASPER. Hog cholera appeared in our county last summer a year ago, and in the 

 summer of 1886 destroyed nearly all the hogs in the county ; we lost at least 85 per 



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