274 VETEEINAEY TOXICOLOGY 



Evidence is brought forward by the experiments con- 

 ducted to show that the disease is not bacterial, although 

 attention is drawn to the high temperature as incompatible 

 with poisoning. 



Feeding tests made with bracken as fresh as possible in 

 1909 and 1910 gave negative results. Thus a heifer took 

 in all 60 pounds of bracken within a week. It was not 

 eaten readily, and was therefore mixed with cut grass 

 and sharps. After the first two meals, containing about 

 30 pounds of bracken, there was indigestion, but no toxic 

 symptoms, and a normal temperature. 



It came within the cognisance of the officers of the Board 

 that the weed tormentil (PotentiUa tormentilla) occurred 

 along with bracken in many localities where bracken disease 

 was reported. This plant is not commonly credited with 

 being poisonous. In feeding tests made with tormentil a 

 case of disease in a heifer having symptoms and lesions 

 similar to those of bracken was produced. 



In the present stage of the inquiry the chief officer 

 refrains from designating tormentil as poisonous and as the 

 cause of this disease, and points out that the possibility of 

 its being a contagion carried by this weed is not excluded. 



Moreover, it must be pointed out that S. B. Nelson,* of 

 Washington, in 1898 fed 4 pounds of PotentiUa to a sheep, 

 which ate it within a day with no ill-effects. 



* Fifteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Animal Industry, 

 1898, p. 425. 



