REARING OF CALVES FOR THE DAIRY. 



221 



In case the cow nurse has been subjected to any great excitement by reason of 

 travel, hunting or carrying, the first milk she yields thereafter should be used 

 for some other purpose, and only the second allowed to the calf. Indeed one 

 and all the conditions above indicated as causes should be judiciously guarded 

 against. 



" Treatment will vary according to the nature and stage of the disease. 

 When the disease is not widespread, but isolated cases only occur, it may be 

 assumed to be a simple diarrhea and is easily dealt with. The first object is to 

 remove the irritant matter from the stomach and bowels, 'and for this one or 

 two ounces of castor oil may be given according to the size of the calf. If the 

 stools smell particularly sour, it may be replaced by one ounce of calcined mag- 

 nesia, and in any case a tablespoonful or two of limewater may be given with 

 each meal. Great harm is often done by giving opium and astringents at the 

 outset. These merely serve to bind up the bowels and retain the irritant source 

 of the trouble, literally ' to shut up the wolf in the sheepfold.' When the offend- 



SOLDENE 2D'S NETHERLAND, No. 8L19 H. F. H. B. 

 The great show bull; never beaten in any class. 



ing agents have been expelled in this way carminatives and demulcents may 

 be given: One dram anise water, one dram nitrate of bismuth, and one dram 

 gum arabic, three times a day. Under such a course the consistency of the 

 stools should increase until in a day or two they become natural. 



" If, however, the outbreak is more general and evidently the result of con- 

 tagion, the first consideration is to remove all sources of such contamination. 

 Test the milk of the cow with blue litmus paper; if it reddens, reject the milk 

 of that cow until by sound dry feeding with perhaps a course of hyposulphite 

 of soda and gentian root, her milk shall have been made alkaline. The castor 

 oil or magnesia will still be demanded to clear away the (now infecting) irrit- 

 ants, but they should be combined with antiseptics, and, while the limewater 

 and the carminative mixture may still be used, a most valuable mixture will 

 be found in the following: Calomel 10 grains, prepared chalk 1 oz., creosote 1 

 teaspoonful; mix, divide into ten parts and give one four times a day. Or the fol- 

 lowing may be given four times a day : 1 dram Dover's powder, 6 grains pow- 

 dered ipecacuanha ; mix, divide into ten equal parts. Injections of solutions 



