CATTLE TICK ERADICATION 311 



When the tick-infested cattle are to be cleaned it is recom- 

 mended that they be kept in a small tick-free enclosure for 

 three weeks, when many of the ticks will have fallen off. They 

 should then be removed to another similar enclosure for another 

 three weeks. After this, they should be examined, and, if 

 found free from ticks, they may be put on non-infested pasture 

 at once. If, however, any ticks are observed, the cattle should 

 be placed in a third enclosure for another two weeks. 



By this time the youngest ticks that were on the cattle at 

 the start will have matured and dropped off, and, as the 

 animals are removed from ea.ch pen before they could have 

 become reinfested by the seed ticks hatched from the eggs of 

 the females that fell off, they are tick-free. It is clear that the 

 enclosures cannot be used repeatedly for the purpose without 

 thoroughly cleansing them from ticks. It should be noted that 

 this method, as described, is only suitable for dealing with the 

 tick which carries the red water organism, which requires to 

 pass through the egg stage in its progress from host to host. 



The Feed-lot Method. — This method is based upon the same 

 considerations in regard to the life-history of the tick as the 

 last. To put it into practice, a field on which forage has been 

 sown is taken, and within it three separate enclosures or " feed- 

 lots " are made, as shown in the diagram. The tick-infested 

 cattle are removed from their customary pasture, and placed 

 in one of these enclosures for twenty days, then transferred to 

 the next for another twenty days, when, in most cases, they 

 will be free of ticks, and can be turned into the forage field. If, 

 however, ticks are still present, the cattle are placed in the 

 third enclosure for fifteen days more, before being passed into 

 the forage field. 



All ticks which were on the animals when placed in the feed- 

 lots will, by this time, have dropped off, and the feed-lots are 

 at once ploughed, their edges sprayed with Beaumont oil or 

 other tick-destroying agent, and the soil cultivated. The cattle 

 are kept on the forage till some five months after they were 

 drawn from the pasture, by which time the latter has lost its 

 ticks by starvation, and the cattle may then be returned to it. 

 It is essential that the feed-lots be enclosed by a fencs, board- 

 tight along the ground, to keep the ticks out of the forage field, 



