300 REPORT OF THE BUREAU OF ANIMAL INDUSTRY. 



FREMONT. To the best of my knowledge there has never been any disease known 

 as hog cholera in our county. No hogs are raised for market. Every ranchman 

 tries to have a few for his own use. Don't think there was ever a hog fattened here 

 on corn. Hogs are of a good grade, but we only have a few in our county. A few 

 horses supposed to be affected with glanders have been condemned and killed by 

 order of our citizens. 



GILMER. Hog cholera is a disease scarcely known in this county, and I very 

 much doubt whether there ever was a real case in the county. This may be at- 

 tributed to the fact that there are no large herds, and the hogs are not confined in 

 large numbers in close and uncomfortable pens. There has been no prevailing dis- 

 ease among any class of farm animals during the past year. 



GRANT. Hog cholera was introduced into the adjoining county (Hardy) four 

 years ago, from a lot of hogs brought in from the West. Shortly after they com- 

 menced to die. Soon it spread in the neighborhood. The farm on which they 

 were placed is some 4 miles below Moorefield, on the south branch of the Potomac. 

 Next year it came up to Petersburgh on the same stream in this county, where a con- 

 siderable number died. The following year it came down in my "neighborhood, 

 on Patterson's Creek. I was the first and only one below the mountain that lost by 

 the disease. How they got it I can not say. My hogs run to the pike and some 

 hogs that were affected were driven down the road. These hogs were infected up 

 on the mountain 3 miles from here, and they certainly did not come in contact with 

 mine. I lost 10 last summer; they were sick all summer and at last they died. 

 The following winter my next neighbor's hogs were attacked. He lost some 20 

 head. Last year (1886) we heard little about it, but this year it has been very 

 fatal and many have died. 



HANCOCK. A disease has prevailed among the hogs of this county the past fall, 

 stated in my last regular report. It is generally regarded as being hog cholera, and 

 has been so pronounced by Dr. Queen, a veterinary surgeon, of Steubenville, Ohio, 

 who was employed by the board of health of this county to investigate the subject. 

 The doctor's opinion is, however, called in question, as you will see from the inclosed 

 clipping made from a local paper (the Hancock Courier) of this day's date : 



" The Steubenville Gazette says : ' Dr. S. E. Queen, veterinary surgeon of this city, 

 being called to Chester, Hancock County, W.Va., to ascertain the character of a 

 disease that was proving fatal to many hogs in that neighborhood, reported to Dr. 

 P. C. McLane, of New Cumberland, president of the county board of health, pro- 

 nouncing the disease typhoid pneumonia, commonly known as ' hog cholera.' He 

 further says regarding the disease: 'It appears to arise from contagion and in- 

 fection only. When an animal is noticed unwell it should be at once isolated or 

 destroyed and the healthy ones removed from the pen or lot and all litter and ex- 

 crement burned and the inclosures cleaned and disinfected. Would also recom- 

 mend that all hogs dying from the disease should be cremated. No specifics have 

 yet been found that would cure or eradicate the epidemic.' 



" Dr. Queen may be the king of horse doctors, but a gentleman from Grant dis- 

 trict informs us that the disease is not ' hog cholera ' at all. He says that the genu- 

 ine hog cholera operates upon the animals the same as the Asiatic cholera does upon 

 human beings, by purging, etc. In this disease there are no such symptoms, but 

 the reverse, and that the animals become feverish, etc. The doctor may be right 

 about its being incurable, for, so far as our knowledge extends, there's no cure for 

 any kind of cholera." 



No disease exists among either horses, cattle, or sheep, and I make no return as 

 to them. The hog disease is confined to a single locality the northern end of the 

 county and has almost wholly abated. 



HARDY. The disease generally known as hog cholera first made its appearance 

 in this county in 1880. Many of us never believed it was cholera. It has the 

 appearance of a lung trouble, beginning with a dry cough and continuing some- 

 times for from four to seven weeks, or till the hog is nothing but a shadow. They 

 do not eat well, and seem to die from starvation. I have known one-half of a 

 drove to die and the others not to be affected at all. There has been less of it 

 recently; in some places where farmers have burned or buried the dead ones there 

 is none of it at all. The raising of horses and mules is gradually increasing, while 

 raising cattle and sheep is decreasing. I think the increase in the horses is at least 

 80 per cent, greater than five years ago. They are generally healthy, and are kept 

 in stables and sheds in rough weather. Some cattle have died of black leg, and a 

 few from hollow-horn as it is called. About all afflicted with the former die, whilst 

 the latter are often saved by boring the horn and applying turpentine. Some sheep 

 have died from grub and some from stomach worms, which latter we have learned 

 to remove with copperas administered in small quantities in the feed. 



HARRISON. Hog cholera does not prevail in this county. Large numbers of 



