480 DISEASES OF CATTLE. 



and safe. These tick-free cattle are then pastured in the sorghum, 

 corn, or millet field containing the feed lots and the latter are plowed 

 immediately after the cattle are taken out, their edges are sprayed 

 with Beaumont oil, petroleum, or other disinfectant substances, and 

 the soil is cultivated. The cattle are kept in the forage field until 

 November 15, or even later, when all the ticks on the regular pasture 

 will have died of starvation from the exclusion of cattle since June 1, 

 and the tick-free animals can then be replaced on this tick-free pas- 

 ture. In adopting this method it is essential that the feed lots be 

 inclosed by a fence which is board-tight along the ground, and that 

 this fence be watched carefully and disinfected occasionally to pre- 

 vent the ticks from getting into the forage field; a single furrow 

 could be thrown up on both sides of the fence for the same purpose. 

 These feed lots should be situated along the edge of the field in order 

 that the cattle in changing from one lot to the other may pass, as 

 directly as possible, through a portion of an adjoining cultivated or 

 tick-free field, so that if the ticks fall off during this drive they will 

 not infest the forage field and later the cattle when pastured therein. 

 The cattle should be fed on the annual crops while in these lots, but 

 never upon crops obtained from infested pastures, as such food may 

 contain seed ticks. Water may be supplied by piping from a well, 

 spring, or creek, by carting it to the feed lots in barrels, or by placing 

 the fence so as to include a spring or portion of a creek, provided 

 the latter does not flow through an infected pasture a short distance 

 above. 



By pasture rotation. — A very satisfactory method for freeing cattle 

 as well as pastures of the cattle tick is by pasture rotation, which 

 combines the suggestions of Curtice, Butler, and Morgan. It is based 

 upon the knowledge that by severing the relation of the fever ticks 

 and the animals upon which they develop these ticks will perish. To 

 adopt this plan first divide the infected pasture into two parts, which 

 is best accomplished by a double line of fence with a 10-foot space 

 between the lines to prevent ticks crossing from one pasture to an- 

 other (fig. 2). In order to observe all possible precautions, this fence 

 should have either a furrow thrown up against it or a board or rail 

 placed tightly along the bottom to help keep the ticks within. All 

 animals that carry the cattle tick are excluded from the first half of 

 the pasture, which may be termed pasture No. 1, from June 1 until 

 November 10, at which time all the ticks that were there will have 

 perished from want of a host and the field will be ready for receiving 

 tick-free cattle. The ticky cattle, on being removed from pasture 

 No. 1 on June 1, are placed in the other half of the original pasture, 

 which may be called pasture No. 2, where they are kept from June 1 

 to September 10. They may now be partly cleaned of ticks by plac- 

 ing them at the latter date (September 10) in a cultivated field for 



instance, a rye or vetch or wheat and vetch field— and by keeping 



