4 BULLETIN 106, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



The average percentage of infection in the slaughtered animals, as 

 shown in this table, is lower than observed generally in herds in New 

 York and other States. The observations here recorded were largely 

 upon cattle of the beef breeds, which are not regularly kept in as 

 close contact as dairy animals. In Chicago there were, however, a 

 considerable number of dairy cows. In dairy animals it is rare to 

 find, at least in the State of New York, a heifer calf 3 months old 

 without the malady, except she has been early removed from her dam 

 and grown in isolation. The table accordingly teaches that the 

 granular venereal disease is essentially universal in its distribution 

 over the area involved. In our abattoir observations no lot was 

 found free, but merely individuals in various lots, which together 

 amounted to 14 per cent. 



Our investigations in herds have revealed no one, however small, 

 free from the infection, though we have examined many in New York 

 and a number in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Illinois, Missouri, Minnesota, 

 Nebraska, Arkansas, and in some European countries. In our 

 search for a herd without the infection, it was believed that in Arkan- 

 sas or some other southern State, where, on account of tick fever, 

 little interchange of cattle had occurred, and where the herds are 

 kept mostly out of doors in a very primitive manner, it would be 

 possible to find cattle free from the malady. Accordingly several 

 herds in central Arkansas were visited, but these showed the evi- 

 dences of the disease as uniformly, though not as severely, as herds 

 in other States. 



DESCRIPTION. 



The granular venereal disease, infectious vaginal catarrh, vaginitis 

 verrucosa, etc., was first described by Isepponi in 1887, since which 

 time it has been recognized and investigated by a great number of 

 writers, chiefly in Switzerland at first, then in Austria, Germany, 

 France, and other continental European countries. 



"When or where the disease began no one knows. It has been stated 

 by numerous writers that the disease has spread during recent years 

 over a province or community or from one region to another, but 

 this recorded spreading of the malady may well be accepted with cau- 

 tion. A knowledge of the existence or the recognition of the presence 

 of a disease may circulate in such a manner as to become confused 

 with the extension of the malady itself, and this is unquestionably 

 true in a large measure of the granular venereal disease. We may 

 well say that this disease is the most universal infection known in 

 any species of domestic animal. 



The granular venereal disease may be defined as a chronic infection 

 of the genital tract of cattle, expressing itself clinically in the form of 

 granular or nodular elevations in the genital mucosa, chiefly of the 

 vulva, less frequently of the vagina. 



