BOVINE PIROPLASMOSIS. 



419 



advances. Later on the animal manifests a strong reluctance to move, 

 and when compelled to do so, it walks with a dragging, straddling 

 gait, as if weak across the loins. In severe cases, when the sick 

 beast is left undisturbed, it will remain almost constantly in one 

 place, standing with its head depressed and ears hanging in a drowsy 

 semi-comatose condition, looking the very picture of complete nervous 

 prostration. Other animals will lie down the greater part of the time 

 and scarcely move, and when 

 dead the limbs will be found 

 in their natural position, and 

 the head doubled round on 

 the shoulder as if asleep. On 

 making a post - mortem ex- 

 amination of some of these 

 cases the carcase was found 

 to be pale and bloodless, as 

 if the animal had been bled 

 to death. 



"In other acute cases a 

 twitching and quivering of 

 the muscles will be observed, 

 especially of those situated 

 in the flank and behind 

 the shoulder. The pulse 

 anjd breathing are much 

 quickened, and the animal 

 will stand and grind its teeth 

 and curl up its upper lip, 

 indicating great uneasiness 

 and pain. The faeces during 

 the early stages of the disease 

 are very often soft, with a 

 tendency to diarrhoea, more 

 especially in transport oxen 



on the road, but they invariably become hard as the disease advances ; 

 but whether hard or soft, they have generally a brownish tinge, and 

 often mixed more or less with blood and mucus. In some severe cases 

 which recover, the favourable crisis is often ushered in by a salutary 

 diarrhoea." 



In the benign form the animal for the space of about a week 

 shows indifference to its surroundings, loses its appetite, wastes, and, 

 less frequently, has slight feverish symptoms, without discoloration 

 of the urine. The only reason for the belief that this trifling 



E E 2 



Fig. 193. — Scutum and scutellum of female 

 Boopliilus annulatus, showing mouth parts, 

 porose areas (p. a.), and eyes {e). Greatly 

 magnified. (Stiles, Ann. Eep., U.S.A. Bur. 

 An. Ind., 1900, p. 392.) 



