DISEASES AND TREATMENT OF CATTLE 
445 
5. Feeding Apples to Cows. 
We do not wonder that there is strong prejudice against 
allowing cows, and especially milk cows, to eat apples. For 
the most part it is well grounded. While it is possible to 
give a milking cow a few ripe apples without drying up her 
milk perceptibly, that is not the kind of apples she usually 
gets. If the cow is in an orchard where apples are falling, 
she runs every time she hears one drop and eats it greedily, 
however wormy, sour, green or bitter it may be. All apples 
have some malic acid in them, even including those that wc 
call "sweet." This malic acid, together with the tannin that 
is found in the apple peel, and especially in green, small 
apples, contracts the cow's stomach. If she eats much of 
such fruit, it gives her the colic just as surely as it does the 
small boy. The cove's stomach wasn't made to digest such 
stuff, and so sure as it is put into her stomach there are riot 
and rebellion. Everyone knows that giving vinegar to cows 
and rubbing her udder with vinegar will dry her off. 
6. Barrenness in Cows and Bulls. 
This is a common thing in well-bred cows, especially in 
Jerseys. 
Causes. — Being kept in too high condition, a diseased 
state of the ovaries, a contracted or diseased state of the neck 
of the womb, or the womb being deformed, such as the neck 
being twisted to one side may be the cause. One or other of 
twin heifers is often barren. Bulls or cows that are too 
closely inbred in the same line of breeding for several genera- 
tions may become barren, or what is known as "run out." It 
is also caused in bulls from fatty degeneration of the testicles 
— mostly seen in old bulls. Rig bulls (that is, those in which 
only one or neither of the testicles are down in the scrotum) 
9»-e sometimes barren. This rule also holds good in horses. 
Treatment. — If caused by a cow being in high condition, 
bleed her; take a half pail of blood away the day before 
taking her to the bull, or give her a physic of one and a half 
pounds of Epsom salts in a quart of lukewarm water as a 
drench. The idea of this is to cool her blood. Examine her, 
and if from contraction of the neck of the womb, pass your 
hand up gently and open by working your fingers in it. If 
from the neck of the womb being to one side, straighten it. 
In doin^ this have your hand and arm oiled. In either of 
