458 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



the evil, and it has certainly been able to show the true con- 

 dition of affairs the last year as it never has before, and hopes 

 that its labors may also have accomplished some good results. 



Blackleg, or Symptomatic Anthrax. 



During the summer of 1900, a disease resembling black- 

 leg in many ways has caused a number of deaths among 

 young cattle at pasture in some parts of Worcester County. 

 Hubbardston was the town where the disease prevailed 

 most extensively and where the chief losses occurred, but 

 similar outbreaks of a more limited extent occurred in sur- 

 rounding towns, and also in towns at some distance from 

 Hubbardston. Cases were reported from Barre, Princeton, 

 Templeton, Rutland, Greenwich, Prescott, Grafton and 

 Ashby, and possibly Westminster. In the latter town 

 there was a rumor of trouble, but it was not investigated, 

 as it was over before the Board heard of it. The cattle 

 found dead in Westminster were thouo;ht to have been chased 

 to death by dogs, but it is barely possible it may have been 

 the same malady met with In the other towns. 



The attention of the Cattle Commission was first called to 

 the presence of the disease by Dr. A. S. Cleaves of Gard- 

 ner, who telephoned to Boston, July 31, reporting an out- 

 break of a disorder similar to anthrax or blackleg in the 

 town of Hubbardston. Commissioner Herrick was immedi- 

 ately telephoned at Worcester, and on the same afternoon 

 visited the scene of trouble with Dr. Cleaves and Mr. A. W. 

 Clarke, a veterinary student, who was at his home in Hub- 

 bardston for his summer vacation. 



The following report from Dr. Cleaves and Mr. Clarke 

 gives a very good history of the Hubbardston outbreak, as 

 well as of one case in Princeton, occurring in a young cow 

 owned by N. B. Reed ; the animal was pastured on Little 

 Wachusett Mountain. The description of the symptoms 

 given below and the gross post-mortem appearances are so 

 good that it is not necessary to attempt to detail them fur- 

 ther ; and the post-mortem conditions found in animals 

 dying in other localities, where autopsies were made, were 

 found to be similar in most cases to those existing among 

 the young cattle in Hubbardston. 



