THE DISEASES OP SHEEP. 293 



vived the operation. What they had, and what 

 most coughing, emaciated lambs have, is a re- 

 lated parasite, of far more import to us all, the 

 dreaded stomach worm. 



THE STOMACH WOKM. 



This little worm is but % of an inch long 

 and about as thick as a hair. It lives in the 

 fourth stomach and especially afflicts lambs. 

 It causes the diseases (or symptoms, rather) of 

 "paper skin", "black scours", "lamb cholera" 

 and so on. It attacks lambs at any age after 

 they begin to nibble grass until cool weather 

 comes in the fall. It is the smallest parasite yet 

 mentioned in this list of diseases and has 

 wrought a hundred times the havoc that these 

 have all together. It has devastated whole 

 regions so that the sheep industry has been 

 given up to them and men have taken to breed- 

 ing swine. The stomach worm is responsible 

 for gullied hillsides, abandoned farms, and sons 

 leaving the farm. It is not a new pest but 

 in olden time men when they suffered from it 

 did not know the cause. Many years ago it 

 swept over Ohio, decimating the Merino flocks, 

 and over all the states of the corn-belt. Then 

 no remedy was known, nor was it understood 

 whence came infection or how immunity could 

 be had. Now we know all this and the stomach 

 worm has lost its terrors to the intelligent and 

 watchful shepherd. 



'This fourth stomach of the sheep is just 

 where the intestines attach and where an im- 

 portant part of the digestion takes place. 



