106 DISEASES OF THE DIGESTIVE APPARATUS. 



II. Special causes. The trouble has been ascribed chiefly 

 to the following causes : 



1. To the different clovers — mainly to the red variety found in 

 the meadows — to lucerne and French grass ; but, in general, this 

 holds good for any kind of green food. It is generally admitted 

 that clover is more dangerous after the application of plaster than 

 when the grass has not been subjected to this form of manure. 

 Ringuet has opposed this theory ; but if the plaster of itself has 

 no effect, it influences vegetation, and thus indirectly favors the 

 development of meteorism. 



2. The lentils, the vetches, separate or mixed with oats, buck- 

 wheat, and a few other grains. 



3. The gramineous plants of swampy and damp meadows, par- 

 ticularly Poa aqiiatica, Scirpus sylvaticus (Haubner, Siedam- 

 grotzky), potato stems, cabbage leaves, rape, turnips, field mustard, 

 and wild radishes. 



4. The young sprouts and leaves of cultivated gramineous plants, 

 etiolated plants, weeds and others, growing in corn or oat fields, 

 and which the animals may eat immediately after harvest when 

 pasturing in the stubble (some time after harvest, when the sun has 

 exercised its salutary influence upon these growths, they are less 

 injurious); also the young wheat sprouts which are at times very 

 abundant a short time after harvest. 



5. The fermented drinks, malt or malt buds, roots and tubercles, 

 cotton dust, when the animals are not used to this food and when 

 they take it in too large quantities. 



6. Various toxic plants the absorption of which provokes more 

 or less serious symptoms of meteorism (Conium maculatum, Cicuta 

 virosa^ Atropa belladonna, Taxus baccata, Veratrum album, Papaver 

 rhœas, Nicotiana tabacum) ; all ranunculaceous species ; the fungi ; 

 poisonings by meat or herring-brine, etc. 



7. Further, the swallowing of air may produce a condition simi- 

 lar to acute tympanites (Weinmann). We observe such cases in 

 nursing calves, when they swallow air w^ith the milk while sucking. 



8. Foreign bodies, too, arrested in the œsophagus and preventing 

 eructation, are a cause of meteorism. 



Pathological anatomy. The larger part of the contents of the 

 rumen consists of gas. Carbonic acid is especially found in it when 

 the animals are kept on a green diet, and carburet of hydrogen if 

 they have consumed dry food. The quantitative and qualitative 



