82 PASTURE AND RANGE. 



It is common in wet places and of wide distribution. 

 It is an upright branching plant from two to six feet 

 high. The pinnately compound leaves have long, narrow, 

 sharply toothed leaflets. The lower ones are long petiol- 

 ed, the upper almost sessile. The white flowers are borne 

 in compound umbels with narrow bracts. 



SUNFLOWER FAMILY Compositae. 

 RAGWORT Senecio Jacobaea L. 



Other Common Names: British Ragwort, Tansy- 

 ragwort, Staggerwort, Stinking Willie. 



Stockmen in eastern Canada formerly lost consider- 

 able numbers of cattle through a mysterious ailment 

 called "Pictou Cattle Disease." The liver was 

 the organ especially attacked. Long periods of 

 Disease nervou s irritability and gradual emaciation were 

 followed by increasing weakness and death. An 

 investigation of the disease by the Canadian Department 

 of Agriculture proved the correctness of suspicions held 

 by farmers for years, that Ragwort was the cause. Since 

 that time experience in England and New Zealand has 

 corroborated this conclusion. 



Both in pasture and in hay, Ragwort has proved 

 poisonous to cattle and, to a lesser extent, to horses. 

 Symptoms Sheep generally eat it with impunity. The 

 effect of the poison is apparently cumulative, 

 and animals may feed on the plant for months before 

 characteristic symptoms develop. Then the hair loses its 

 lustre, the animal becomes irritable and nervous, with 

 occasional chills, followed later by a paleness of the 



