4U 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Sept. 



turned into the mouth must ffo down the breath- 

 pipe, wliich mu>;t cause siiffoi:ation. I will give 

 you my way to relieve choked cattle. If the sub- 

 stance that they are choked with is above the 

 brisket, so that you can feel it, place your h mds 

 hack of it, and, wiih your thumbs on each side of 

 it, gently and gradually shove it up and out. I 

 have relieved a great many, and have never Dried 

 in a case but what I was succf s^ful. 



Levi Davenport. 

 Cole7-ain, Mass., June 28, 18G9. 



BOTS IN HORSES. 



Enclosed in box you will find two worms, a sam- 

 ple of the kind of many that have passed my horse 

 within the last few days. What kind are they, 

 what do they originate fiOm, and what shall I do 

 to get rid of them ? A Subscriber. 



Quidnick, R. I., July 2, 1869. 



Remahks. — The specimens sent are bots. We 

 copy the (bllowing exi-ellent illustration of a group 

 of bots attached to the stomach of a horse, and a 

 full history of the Bot, from "Stoncharge, McClure 

 and Harvey on the Horse," a very complete work, 

 recently published by Porter & Coates, Philadel- 

 phia: — 



The larvn3 of the oestrus equi, a species of gadfly, 

 are often found in 1 ;rge numbers, attached by a 

 pair of hooks with which they are provided, to the 

 cardiac extremity of the stomach; they are very 

 rarely met with in the true digestive portion of 

 this organ, but sometimes in the duodenum or 

 jejunum in small numl)ers. A group of these 

 larvo2, which are popularly called Dots, are repre- 



Grouj) of Bots attached to the Stomach. 



sentcd by the annexed cut, but sometimes nearly 

 all the cardiac extremity of the stomach is occu- 

 pied with them, the interstices being occupied by 

 liLtle projections which are caused by tho.^e that 

 have Lt go their hold, and have been expelled 

 with the food. Several of these papilhu are shown 

 on the engraving, which delineates also the ap- 

 pearance of the bots thdmselves, so that no one 

 can full to recognize them when he sees them. 

 This is important, tor it often haiipuns that a med- 

 dlesome groom when he sees them expelled from 

 or hanging to the verge ot the anus, as they often 

 do tor d short time, ttiinks it necessary to use 

 strong medicine ; whereas in the first place he does 



no good, for none is known which will kill 

 the larviE without danger to the horse, and in the 

 second, if he will only have a liitle patience, every 

 bot will come away in the natural cour.->e of things, 

 and until the horse is turned out to grass, during 

 the season when the oestrus deposits its eggs, he 

 will never have another in his stomach. 



The ceUrus equi comes out from the pupa state 

 in the middle and Litter part of summer, varying 

 according to ilie season, and the female soon finds 

 the proper nidus for her eggs in the h.iir of the 

 nearest horse turned out to grass. She manages to 

 glue them to the sides of the hair so firmly that no 

 ordmary friction will get rid of them, and her in- 

 stinct teaches her to select those parts withii 

 reach of the horse's tongue, sucli as the hair of the 

 fore legs and sides. Here they remain until the 

 heat ot the sun hatches them, when, being no 

 larger in diameter than a small pin, each larva is 

 licked off and c'arried down the gullet lo the stom- 

 ach, to the thick epithelium of which it soon at- 

 taches itself by its hooks. Here it remains until 

 the next spring, having attained the size which is 

 represented in the ensriving during the course of 

 the first two months of its hte, and then it fulfils its 

 allotted career, by Jetting go and being carried 

 out with the dung. On reaching the outer air it 

 soon assumes the chrysalis condition, and in three 

 or lour weeks bursis its covering to become the 

 perfect insect. 



P'rom this history it will be evident that no pre- 

 veniive measures will keep off the attacks of the 

 fly when the horse is at grass, Jnd, indeed, in those 

 districts where they abound, they will deposit 

 tlicir ova in the hair of the stabled horse if he is 

 allowed to stand still for afcw minutes. The eggs 

 are, however, easily recognized in any horse but, a 

 chestnut, to which color they closely assiiuiiate, 

 and as they are never deposited in large numbers 

 on the stabled horse they may readily be removed 

 by the groom. Unlike other parasites, they seem 

 to do little or no harm, on account of the insensi- 

 ble nature of the part of the stomach to wnich they 

 are attached, and, moreover their presence is sel- 

 dom discovered until the season of their migration, 

 when interference is uncalled for. On all accounts, 

 therefore, it is unnecessary to ent-^r into the ques- 

 tion, whether it is possible to expel them; and 

 even if by chance one comes away prematurely it 

 will be wise to avoid interfering by attempting to 

 cause the expulsion of those left behind. 



Dr. Dadd says, in some of his later books, that 

 though be once beli,;ved, as most of the veterinary 

 schools teach, that bots are harmless to horses, 

 yet the facts of his experience and observation had 

 forced him to a ditTereut conclusion. In one case 

 where a horse died in his presence, "the autopsy 

 revealed the presence of a large cluster of bots, 

 numbering two hundred and seventy-five, located 

 within and around the lower part of the gullet, 

 and just within the entrance of the stomach; and 

 so completely obstructing the passage that it was 

 impossible for the food to pass," and he had no 

 doubt that bots were the exciting cause of the 

 death of the horse. 



In one sense, all parasites may be said to be 

 "natural" — lice on animals and trees, borers, tape 

 worms, flies, fleas, ticks, grubs, &c , &c. But when 

 in excess, if not at other times, all these are known 

 to be injurious to the health and vigor of the plant 

 or animal on which they prey. The scale louse, 

 notwithstanding "the insensible nature" of the 

 bark of an apple tree, will, if numerous, check its 

 growth, if not destroy its life. Why then may 



