. CICUTA, OR WATER IlEMl.OC'K. 7 



record. For example, there seems to be no definite record of poison- 

 ing in Montana. Yet in the year 1900 alone, according to Chesnut 

 and Wilcox, there were five cases of poisoning of human beings in 

 the State, resulting in four fatalities, and a loss of 30 head of cattle 

 and 80 sheep. These could not be plotted, as no definite localities 

 were given. The writers of this bulletin have been informed of many 

 losses of cattle in Colorado, but no accounts were sufficiently definite 

 to admit of plotting. 



In regard to sheep, we have a definite local record of only one case 

 of poisoning, at Klamath Falls, Oreg. Yet the yearly losses are 

 heavy. Figure 1, then, must not be considered as giving more than 

 a very incomplete record. 



The greater number of cases recorded in the East as compared 

 with the West is partly due to the greater density of population and 

 partly to the special interest taken in the subject in some locahties. 

 The number of locations in Wisconsin is largely due to the interest 

 which Prof. Power took in verifying reported cases in that State. 



LOSSES OF LIVE STOCK FROM CICUTA POISONING IN THE UNITED STATES. 



There are no data from which we can make a reliable estimate of 

 the stock losses from Cicuta poisoning. One man in Oregon, pre- 

 sumably estimating the loss in his immediate neighborhood, makes 

 it 10 per cent. Slade, 1903, estimates a loss of a hundred head of 

 cattle a year in Oregon. 



Chesnut and Wilcox, 1901, say that in 1900 in Montana 30 head of 

 cattle and 80 head of sheep were lost. Probably the losses in the 

 aggregate are very small. Individual owners of stock have occasion- 

 ally lost rather heavily, but the total loss does not compare at all 

 with the deaths from other poisonous plants, such plants, for exam- 

 ple, as the locos and larkspurs. 



USES OF CICUTA. 



Most plant substances with positive, evident characteristics have 

 been assumed to have properties useful in medicine. As would be 

 supposed, Cicuta, with its violent toxic character, has attracted 

 attention and has been used for a great variety of diseases. Wepfer, 

 1679, Chapter XXII, discusses its uses in some detail, but most, if 

 not aU, that he says refers to Conium rather than Cicuta. 



Gadd, 1774, says that the Finns drive crickets from their homes 

 with Cicuta. It may be questioned, however, whether this is any- 

 thing more than a story that he had heard. 



In later times Cicuta has been used in medicine to a limited extent. 

 Rafinesque, 1828, p. 110, says: 



A few grains have beea given in schirrose and scrofulous tumors and ulcers, with 

 equal advantage, but a larger dose produces nausea and vomiting; the doses should 

 be very small, often repeated, and gradually increased. It has been used as a gargle 

 for sore throat, but safer substances ought to be preferred. 



