1920.] Education and Research in Poultry Keeping. 851 



If we turn from statistics to what has actually been done, 

 there is just as convincing an answer respecting the justifica- 

 tion of research on the ground of its utility. Research has 

 already thrown much light on obscure diseases, notably in the 

 case of bacillary white diarrhoea. This disease is acknowledged 

 to be caused by a specific micro-organism, and is more than 

 commonly dangerous. A healthy hen may not only transmit 

 it to her chicks, but be the means of infecting healthy premises. 

 One of the triumphs of poultry research has been the discpvery 

 that a chick that has recovered from the disease may retain 

 the virus in its system. Later, in the pullet, the ovary may 

 become infected, and the virus handed on in the eggs. It is 

 fortunate that many of such eggs fail to hatch, as if an infected 

 egg hatches, the chick suffers from the disease and transmits 

 it to other chicks. 



Research has been principally concerned with the discovery 

 of the cause of disease in order that it may be eliminated. 

 Curative measures, however, have not been neglected, although 

 these, unless applicable in bulk, are not likely to appeal to the 

 poultry owner, except in the case of valuable birds. 



Turning to the second question : Is research necessary? an 

 affirmative is not difficult to support. There is no poultry keeper 

 who has not met vath cases of disease that could not be labelled 

 with a familiar name. The pathologist freely confesses that he 

 is frequently at a loss to suppty a diagnosis. If there are diffi- 

 cult problems still unsolved in mammalian pathology, it is readily 

 understood that there are many more in the much fresher field 

 of avian pathology. 



The lecturer mentioned a number of little-know^n diseases. 

 What is the oedema of the wattles occurring in Australia, the 

 disease recorded by Mazza in Upper Italy, and the semblance of 

 fowl cholera, but apparently caused by a larger organism? What 

 is the cause of fowl plague? Is the so-called avian diphtheria 

 one disease or many? These questions are not purely academic. 

 He would be a rash person who would venture to assert that 

 their answers can be of no practical utility. 



• Again, there are many diseases that have apparently been 

 reported only once. In these cases it is in the highest degree 

 unlikely that a particular disease has suddenly appeared and 

 then as suddenly disappeared. It is much more probable that 

 it is one of those unidentified diseases met with almost every day. 



The relation of parasites to disease also offers a fruitful 

 field for inquiry. Much is known, but this section of parasitology 



