84 The Transactions of the South African Philosophical Society 
NOTE ON LOCUSTS AS PROPAGATORS OF 
FOOT AND MOUTH DISEASE. 
By Dr. KANNEMEYER. 
READ JULY 26, 1893. 
Several isolated outbreaks of foot and mouth disease have occurred in 
our district (Albert) which could not be ascribed to the ordinary channel 
of infection. ‘Take as a typical case that of Mr. Jacob Kruger, of Tam- 
fontein. He grazes his milch-cows in a paddock where uo other stock 
is allowed to enter, and which is situated at a considerable distance 
from the cattle-run. No road passes through or near the paddock ; the 
cows have for some time past not been in contact with other animals, 
healthy or sick ; the rest of the stock on the farm were all healthy, and 
so were the herds of the neighbours for at least two removes deep. 
Suddenly foot and mouth disease breaks out among these cows. 
It is well known that cattle suffering from the foot and mouth 
disease secrete a great quantity of frothy tenacious mucus which adheres 
to the herbage. Mr. Piet Hennings, one of our most intelligent 
farmers, found that locusts coming from infected localities near his 
farm were covered with this secretion, which had clung to them whilst 
settling on the tainted spots. Here we have a feasible, if unexpected 
and startling, solution of the mystery. An additional element of 
danger lies in the fact that all our domestic animals, without exception, 
greedily devour locusts. For the time being they forsake their 
ordinary food to feast on them; and with reason, for thus fed they 
fatten and thrive in a remarkable degree. It is of interest, and worth 
noting, that two decades having elapsed since our last visitation, the 
graminivorous animals then alive, and addicted to the habit, have in 
the interval practically all died, consequently when the present invasion 
came, our cattle, at first, did not touch them; but probably during 
night-grazing, when the locusts cluster in a torpid state on each shrub 
and culm, they speedily discovered the delicacy, and now locust-eating 
has again hardened into a universal practice. 
If it can be established that locust infection is a fact and of 
frequent occurrence, then the immense swarms which now over- 
spread the country must render all attempts at isolation and 
quarantine nugatory and impossible in those tracts where the locusts 
are found. However, even such an unavoidable and prolific source 
of infection would not be an unmitigated evil if it were to result in 
determined and persistent efforts to destroy the locust pest, if it 
were to rouse the country from its apathy, and if it led to the 
