BOOPHIIvUS ANNULATUS. BOOPHILUS BOVIS. RHI- 

 PICEPHAI.US ANNULATUS. IXODIS BOVIS. I. 

 DUGESII. I. PLUMBEUS. I. ALGERIENSIS. TEXAS 

 FEVER TICK. 



Identification with ticks known under other names. Geographical distri- 

 bution : Southern United States, Southern Europe, N. Africa ; characters of 

 female and male. Six-legged larva. Development : Eggs hatch in three or 

 four weeks in summer, moult and form octopod nymphae in one week, on 

 calf ; moult again, becoming mature in one week more on calf and are fertil- 

 ized, fertilized female lays eggs in 22 to 26 days. Hosts : cattle, deer, (and 

 less frequently horses), mostly on pubis, perineum, udder and scrotum. 

 Pathogenesis : local irritations ; inoculates piroplasma bigeninum, causing 

 Texas fever ; piroplasma conveyed through ova and next generation of 

 ticks. In localities free from piroplasma, the indigenous tick causes local 

 irritation only. 



The same tick appears to have been described under these 

 difEerent names. Neumann further identifies with this species, 

 HcBtnaphysalis Rosea of the West Indies, the HcemaphysaKs 

 Micropla of Italy, the Rhipicephalus Calcaratus of the Caucasus, 

 and Rhipicephalus Annulatus Caudatus of Japan in spite of the 

 distinctive caudal spur borne by the latter. 



The Boophilus Annulatus is abundant in our Southern States, 

 in Southern Europe and North Africa (Cooper Curtice). 



Female. Body elliptical, broadest in cephalo- thorax, constricted 

 slightly in a transverse direction in the middle near legs IV ; 

 when replete, approximating to a parallelogram ; when fasting, 

 flattened, coriaceous, narrowed behind, color — from a tawny 

 yellow (young) to an olive green (old), often marbled with ir- 

 regular waving lines of yellow and black, often a central line of 

 yellow with two marginal lines of black, then two more lines of 

 yellow and two more of black. Dorsal shield (scutum) promi- 

 nent and convex in the dried .specimen, very much shorter in the 

 female than in the male, showing as a dark brownish spqt in the 

 anterior end of the median line, and deeply notched to receive 

 the head (capitulum). Two lateral dorsal grooves ending a little 

 behind legs IV. One median groove in posterior part of body. 

 All these grooves vary with muscular contraction and disappear 

 under repletion. Ventral aspect shows laterally in anterior half, 

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