1 10 DISEASE AMONG SWINE AND OTHER DOMESTIC ANIMALS. 



state here that a drove of Texas cattle slipped through this county in September last, 

 and left a disease which killed at least $2,000 worth of native stock. I lost five head of 

 cattio myself by it, aud I can say with all truth that we would all feel much safer if 

 wo had a remedy for this terrible scourge. 



Your department should never rest until Congress furnishes the means to sift the 

 terrible disease of hog-cholera to the bottom, aud through science and experiment 

 find either a preventive or cure. There are more hogs that die of this disease every 

 year than are consumed by the people of the Western States. Our farmers could 

 afford to pay one-fourth of the national debt to be relieved of this one disease ; and 

 if they had certain cures for poison by worm-dust, for bots lyid blackleg, the amount 

 eaved in twenty years would pay another fourth. 



Cholera is very destructive to all kinds of domestic fowls. I have recently lost over 

 one hundred chickens by it, and one of my neighbors as many turkeys. The loss was 

 equal to 96 per cent, of our flocks. AVe have no remedy for the disease. 



Mr. W. L. RoBBiNS, Mayfield, Graves County, Kentucky, says: 



For the last twelve months we have been suffering from a disease called hog-cholera* 

 Examination after death reveals an atfection of the lungs and intestines. The hogs 

 live but a short time after they are taken with the disease, and generally die in their 

 beds and apparently without much suffering. We have beeu unable to find a remedy. 

 Copperas, arsenic, sulphur, salt, and wood-ashes are used as preventives, and it is 

 thought with beneficial results. Not over 10 per cent, of those attacked recover. 



We also suffer to some extent witli chicken-cholera. Alum administered in wheat- 

 dough is regarded as both a preventive and cure, but it cannot always be relied upon 

 as either. 



Mr. Geoege Hunter, Carlinville, Macoupin County, Illinois, says: 



Presuming that breeders of the several classes of farra-animals and fowls will re- 

 spond to your circular-letter with such information as concerns mainly the class with 

 which severally they are most conversant, I shall confiue myself to a few pertinent 

 facts coming under my observation as a breeder of swine. I state upon careful Ln- 

 qniry and personal observation in my own neighborhood and adjacent localities, that 

 about 20 per cent, of the entire hog crop, in numbers, die annually of the various dis- 

 eases incident to swine. Of this loss about 15 per cent, is probably due to hog-cholera, 

 and the remaining .5 per cent, to other (practically) obsciu'e ailments. In this section 

 of Illinois, which is one of the heaviest corn and pork producing regions of the West, 

 I should estimate the loss annually, in dollars, by the diseases among swine, as equal 

 to about one-fourth of the entire hog product. From the mass of general statistical 

 information to which one properly turns in this connection, it may be inferred with a 

 reasonable certainty that in this class of animals alone the country at large sustains 

 an annual loss of at least $15,000,000 by the ravages of disease, the State of Illinois 

 bearing perhaps i52,.500,000 of the loss as her share. 



As to measures of prevention or treatment (inquired of), whatever may be known 

 to veterinary science, or possibly professional skill, nothing, by way of general relief, 

 has been accomplished. No precautions of a general character, to prevent the spread 

 of contagion ; no concert of action for the purpose of disinfection, has ever, so far as I 

 know, been attempted. And basing my observation upon the magnitude of the inter- 

 est involved, the wide-spread character of the evil, and the highly contagious and fatal 

 character of the disease prevailing, I respectfully submit that no amount of private 

 enterprise or personal effort can avail for the protection of the public good, aud that 

 no system of prevention or disinfection can ever be adn])ted, of a sufficiently general 

 or nniform character, to be eliective in pi'otecting the public interests in this matter, 

 unless that system rests upon the authority of goverument, aud an adec^uate fund, 

 such as Congress alone can provide. 



It can scarcely be of service to increase the enormous mass of confused, illogical, 

 and contradictory reports of diseases and treatment which are found at every hand, as 

 enough already appears in these accounts to show that nothing more is to be hoped 

 for in that direction. Facts enough have been laid before the public, observations and 

 conclusions enough, bearing the test of scientific experiment, have been made, upon 

 which to predicate the belief that a competent commission, having the requisite author- 

 ity and funds, could easily frame and establish a system of simple sanitary measures, 

 which, being generally applied to this class of farm-animals alone, would result in avast 

 saving to the country, eveii though no specific cure for that dreadful scourge, " hog- 

 cholera," should be discovered. Let the appropriation be made, let the commission be 

 authorized, an<l let its investigations be thorough and searching. This I take to be 

 the general view of the subject on the part oftliose who have given the matter atten- 

 tion. 



