CUAl'TlvK \lll. 



Tuberculosis. 



Tulirrculosis in fowls has long been a serious pest in I'.urope. 

 Zurn in his ''Krankheiten des Hausoeflugels," published in 1882, 

 devotes several pages to the description of this disease as it 

 occurred in Germany. Its appearance in this country, however, 

 seems to have been much more recent. 



Sahiiou, whose book was published al)out 1888, says that the 

 disease "is bv no means rare in the Tnited vStates if the state- 

 ments of our professional men are to l)e accepted." However, 

 at that time very little had been done in the way of bacterio- 

 logical diagnosis and no doubt many of the early reports were 

 unreliable. 



The disease was first reported on the basis of bacteriological 

 examination in 1900 by Ternot (Oregon Agr. Expt. Stat. Bull. 

 64). In 1903 Moore and Ward reported investigations on 

 avian tu])erculosis in California ( I'roc. Am. A'et. Med. Assoc. 

 1903 ). They found "a number of ilocks in which the mortality 

 from the disease was very high." Fowl tuberculosis was re- 

 ported from western and central Catiada in 1904 by Dr. C. Tf. 

 Higgins (Dept. of Agr. Canada. 1905). Tn 1906 it was re- 

 ported from Xew ^'ork and in 1907 from southern Michigan. 

 The di.sease has ])een reported in many other ])laces within the 

 la^t few years, it thus seems certain that the disease is wide- 

 spread throughout the United vStates and Canada and in the 

 future un\>i be reckoned with by American ]> 'ultrymen. 



Tuberculosis may exist exten>i\-ely among fowls, especially 

 in large Hocks, and \et not kill enough ])irds to .altract attention 

 to it. Keports show that fanners often lo-r 1 or _' birds a 

 year from what appears to ])c tuberculosis. In many places the 

 loss seems to be gradually increasing. The existence of the 

 disease in the Hock fails to attract the attention of the owner 

 because the li^-cs are so evenly distril)iited through'mt the year. 

 Aloore and Ward rej)ort a Hock of 1400 birds from which 250 

 had died during the hrst vear. .\nother man lost 300 birds out 



