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TEXAS FEVER IN CALIFORNIA. 



United States Department of Agriculture, 

 Bureau of Animal Industry, 

 Washington, D. C, April 24, 1896. 



Hon. J. Sterling Morton, Secretary of Agriculture: 



Sir: As requested by you, I submit the following report covering the 

 most important information in the possession of this Department con- 

 cerning the existence of the disease known as Texas fever in California. 

 This disease is also known, and is referred to in quotations made below, 

 as Southern fever, Splenic fever, Splenitic fever, and Spanish fever. 



My attention was first called to the existence of this disease in Cali- 

 fornia by reports made by Mr. A. S. Mercer during 1886. Mr. Mercer 

 was at that time employed as an Inspector of this Bureau, and was 

 under instructions to investigate the cattle industry of California. I 

 (piote the remarks concerning this disease which were included in his 



report for 1886: 



"splenic fever. 



" Splenic fever, or what is generally known as Texas fever in the 

 country east of the Rocky Mountains, prevails to a very considerable 

 extent in California. My attention was first called to this matter by a 

 gentleman whom I met on the cars while crossing the Sierra Nevada 

 Mountains in June last. He incidentally mentioned the fact that he 

 had lost a good many cattle from a cause he did not understand, and, 

 on being asked for details, stated that in 1877 he bought four hundred 

 steers in Tulare, which were shipped to his pasture, near Stockton, two 

 hundred miles north, and turned out to graze with about one thousand 

 head of natives and Oregon cattle that had been in the field for several 

 months. About twenty-five days after the Southern cattle were turned 

 into the pasture, the natives and Oregon cattle began to die, and within 

 a few weeks one hundred and sixty head died. These were all cattle 

 that had cost him $40 a head, and the loss of $6,400 was rather start- 

 ling. None of the Southern steers died, or even showed signs of sickness. 



"Again, in 1885, his partner bought two hundred steers from the same 

 Tulare range, then owned by J. M. Craighton, and after shipping turned 

 them into a pasture near Stockton with four hundred Northern and 

 native cattle. The experience of 1877 was had over again, sixty head of 

 the Northern cattle dying in a few weeks, and the Southern cattle show- 

 ing no symptoms of disease. A few of the dead cattle were opened, and, 

 in the language of the owner, 'were found to have melt twice its natural 

 size, and soft, like liver; the contents of the stomach were dry and crisp, 

 looking like they had been partially burned. Some of the sick cattle 

 passed bloody urine. Generally they would hump up for a day or two, 



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