SCIENCE BULLETIN, No. 12. 



Mr. Ramsay adds calculations which show that a cow fed on the grasses 

 growing on the affected areas would get only one half of the mineral matters 

 found necessary to maintain health. 



He also adds some analyses of bones taken from cattle suffering from 

 osteo-malacia, which show that they are poorer in ash, notably in lime and 

 phosphoric acid, than bones from healthy cattle from unaffected areas in the 

 same district. 



Analyses were also made of the water taken in unaffected and affected areas 

 respectively, but no definite results were obtained, and the analyses are not 

 recorded. 



When we add to all the above the undoubted facts, vouched for by Mr. 

 Henry and the officers of the Stock Branch of the Department, that the 

 disease can be cured by removing the stock to areas of richer soil and 

 herbage, or by giving them a lick composed essentially of phosphate of lime, 

 the conclusion is warranted that poverty of the food in mineral ingredients, 

 due primarily to poverty of the soil which supports this herbage, is the 

 predisposing cause in producing bone-chewing amongst cattle in this 

 country. 



Diseases of a similar nature amongst stock are met with in other parts of 

 the world, which possess many characteristics in common with the one under 

 discussion. More than one theory has been put forward as to their cause. 



In South Africa, for example, a disease known as " Lamziekte," t which, 

 though not identical with, possesses many points of similarity to, the local 



disease, has been made the subject of a considerable amount of investiga- 

 tion, and the predisposing cause has been attributed by some to cumulative 

 Tegetable poisoning (Theiler and Robertson), by others to the absence of 

 phospho-proteins (Dr. Juritz), to infection, and to water-borne infection, as 

 well as absence of mineral salts. Another theory is that the disease is 

 analogous to beri-beri, and is caused by the lack of some vitally protective 

 and curative substance (Stead).* 



American investigators have also given attention to osteo-malacia. F. H. 

 McCruddenf shows that in the bones of diseased animals the lime is reduced 

 by one-half, and the phosphoric acid by one-third of the quantities present 

 in the bones of healthy animals. This difference is a very much greater 



one than we have been able to find. 



W. Dibbelt^: has induced artificial osteo-malacia by feeding with certain 

 salts which remove lime from the organism, and has cured the diseases 

 ^y withdrawing these salts. 



G. Moussu, dealing with osteo-malacia in pigs, concludes that it is purely 

 an infectious disease. The disease, as described by him, does not appear to be 



*Vide Journal of the Department of Agriculture of the Union of South 

 Africa for 1913 and 1914. 



fAmer. Journ. Physiology, 1906, vol. xvli, p. 32. 



JZeitsch: Biochem : Biophys, vol. xii, p. 504. 



gJournal d' Agriculture pratique, 1914, Tome 1, No. 13, p. 395. 



