314 



Diseases of Sheep. 



patient should be fed on liaj or clover-chaff, sprinkled with com- 

 mon salt ; and^ for some weeks after recovery, the character of 

 its food should be attentively regulated, avoiding all succulent 

 vegetables as much as possible until health is completely restored. 



It may not be improper to mention other remedies that have 

 been quoted as beneficial. In the Agricultural Report of the 

 county of Stafford, a table-spoonful of spirits of turpentine mixed 

 with two of water, twice administered, after an interval of 3 days, 

 is said to have cured 5 out of G rotten sheep. Salt, to the extent 

 of a table-spoonful, has also been given with useful effect ; and it 

 is a matter of acknowledged experience, that the sheep fed on 

 salt marshes are not liable to the complaint. I am also bound 

 to admit that the use of mercury has been deprecated by some 

 writers, who assert that, in herbivorous animals, mercury has not 

 the same specific action that it has in the human subject. It is 

 well known, however, that in horses calomel is often administered 

 with decided benefit in hepatic affections ; but I think it right to 

 mention the variety of opinion that exists on such an important 

 topic. I have known the recipe, which I quote in the Appendix 

 (No. 6), administered with very salutary effects. 



I may here notice another precautionary measure, which is I 

 believe rarely taken, — to avoid turning the sheep out of the fold 

 while the dew is on the ground. Dewy vapours are well known to 

 be injurious to the animal in feeding.'"' 



Dropsy, or Water-sickness, is a disease very generally 

 known to shepherds. It seems to proceed from constitutional 

 debility rather than from any accidental cause, though it is most 

 frequently met with where the pastures are bleak. Aged sheep 

 are most liable to it. Its symptoms are all of the dropsical kind. 

 Swellings appear and change their seat v/ithout apparent cause ; 

 the sheep becomes dull and languid, and, ultimately, the belly is 

 distended with water, and the motion of it can be perceptibly felt 

 against the hand. I can recommend no other treatment than a 

 substitution of hay, of the best quality, cut into chaff, for all moist 

 food ; and to this may be added oatmeal -gruel : the sheep being 

 carefully housed, and the bowels kept open. A decoction of 

 oak-bark has been favourably spoken of; but though, in all 

 dropsical affections tonics seem to be the natural remedy, I can- 

 not from my own experience testify to their success in this case. 

 Tapping will produce no permanent effect ; the water will rapidly 

 accumulate again, unless the seat of the disorder is attended to. 



Redwater, or Resp, is sometimes confounded with bloody 



* I prefer my lambs to have their food early during the summer months ; 

 the Hampshire farmers turn their lambs out as early as three, four, and 

 five o'clock in the morning ; and they make a higher price of their store 

 lambs early in the season than the farmers of any other county in England. 



— W. HUMFREY. 



