6 47 



ment of the larval iluke, one of these licks should be constantly 

 kept within reach of the sheep. 



The symptoms of Iluke are easily recognised. The eyes lose 

 their brightness and the whites assume the hue of bad tallow. The 

 skin becomes moist and has a dull appearance, quite different to 

 the bright hue of a healthy skin, and the wool is easily detached 

 from it. As the disease progresses, dropsy sets in, and the sheep 

 dies almost in a state of rottenness. 



Fluke is seldom, if ever, seen in 'the hot plains of central 

 Australia, and what is known as salt country is also free from it. 

 One of the best preventives of tluke is to burn the pastures every 

 now and again. This kills the snails that form the intermediate 

 host of the larval fluke. Heavy stocking greatly assists in spreading 

 the disease. 



ANTHRAX. 



Also known as carbuncular murrain and splenetic apoplexy 

 in England, is one of the most fatal of the diseases to which 

 the sheep are liable. Like the fluke, it has a very wide range and is 

 dreaded by sheep farmers all over the world. It is a blood disease, 

 and is caused by a microbe which is capable of leading an independ- 

 ent existence for years in the soil. It has the character of an acute 

 inflammatory fever and is communicated by contagion from one 

 animal to another. It thrives best in rich, deep soil, such as that 

 usually bordering the margins of rivers and creeks. Warm, rainy 

 weather is favorable to its developments. There are few, if any, 

 premonitory symptoms and it is difficult to say whether the animal 

 attacked is diseased or not until it is dead. 



The symptoms usually noticed are, the animal is dull and lan- 

 guid, the back is arched, and shortly before death a bloody, slimy 

 matter is, in most instances, ejected from the nostrils and the anus. 

 The post iiior.'c'ii examination shows all the internal organs to be 

 discolored and almost decomposed. It is dangerous to make a post 

 mortem examination of a sheep that has died of anthrax if there 

 should be any cuts or sores on the hands. Anthrax is communicable 

 to human beings, the well known wool-sorter's disease being a form 

 of it. 



Where anthrax is suspected as the cause of death in sheep, the 

 best plan is to burn the body as soon after death as possible. 

 Anthrax is seldom met with in sandy calcareous country, and frost at 

 once arrests its destructive tendency. There is no cure for sheep 

 attacked by anthrax, indeed, the first intimation the flock-master has 

 that the disease is in his sheep, is the finding of the dead animals, 

 usually the best conditioned ones in the flock. 



Fortunately there is a safe and certain preventive of this fatal 

 disease, the discovery of which we owe to the great French 

 scientist, M. Pasteur. He discovered that the attenuated virus of 

 the disease gave immunity to the sheep, and annually many millions 

 of sheep are now inoculated in Europe. The inoculation of 



