330 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



The committee was constituted by the appointment of Messrs. 

 Loring, Thompson and Perkins. 



On Thursday, the 8th, the matter under discussion was the 

 disease among swine, and many important facts were stated by 

 by Messrs. Moore, Slade, Davis, Taft and others. 



It is believed that comparatively few are aware of the great 

 losses that have occurred from the purchase of swine that have 

 passed through the public markets. They not only die them- 

 selves from the infection caught in the cars or the pens into 

 which they are turned on their arrival from the West, but they 

 convey this infection to large numbers of others with which 

 they are brought in contact, and death is the almost certain 

 result. 



The only way to avoid these frequent and serious losses seems 

 to be to raise our own swine or to purchase those only that are 

 raised in the neighborhood from stock known to be healthy. 

 The farmer who has lost swine from this disease, popularly 

 known as the " hog cholera," should also take the precaution 

 not to put other hogs subsequently bought, into the pens occu- 

 pied by those that have died. Such pens are infected, and it is 

 with the utmost difficulty that this infection can be entirely 

 removed. It was 



VotedftThQ.t the State Board of Agriculture, in view of the 

 losses incurred by the disease known as the " hog cholera," and 

 of the information gathered from all parts of the State, of the 

 great extent of these losses, and of its great contagiousness, not 

 only from diseased hogs, but from pens in which they have been 

 kept, recommend to the farmers of Massachusetts that they raise 

 swine for their own use, and for the market. 



Voted, That the raising of hogs for the market, is of itself, in 

 our opinion, one of the most profitable sources of revenue to the 

 farmer. 



Voted, That a committee be appointed to investigate and 

 report upon the nature and extent of the disease among swine — 

 IVtcssrs. Davis, Slade, Smith and Moore. 



Voted, That each member of the Board be requested to 

 gather what facts may be in his power in regard to the agricul- 



