176 
Report on Liver-Rot. 
his farm, sparrows and rooks at certain seasons doing consider- 
able damage. He has a great many fowls in boxes moved on 
wheels about the fields, and where these fowls are mostly kept 
he declares that he has no fear of rot. He understands that 
hares and rabbits during the last few years have been found dead 
on the low lands with flukes in their livers. He has lost bought- 
yearling bullocks from rot, but has not known any cases in 
horses. Asked if lambs or calves reared exclusively on their 
mother's milk are ever affected by flukes, he replied, " Decidedly 
not." The disease, he stated, was very serious in Notts and 
Leicester in 1879, but it has been worse by far since. Many 
farmers have lost, and others are now losing, the whole of their 
flocks. Although the flukes are picked up during the late 
summer months, a variable time occurs before the disease shows 
itself. Sheep well kept, and in mild weather, may be six or 
eight months before they show any falling off. The sharp 
winter usually carries off the affected. The recent six weeks' 
snow and frost has given a quietus to thousands. On good dry 
land Mr. Smith has no fear of rot. The flooded land he finds most 
dangerous, and in illustration refers to the two adjacent parishes 
of Cropwell Butler and Tithby ; in the former not a sheep is 
attacked ; in the latter, where for two years the grass has been 
frequently flooded by the Smite, nearly all the flocks, both ewes 
and hoggs, were affected, and were sold off. When once a large 
colony of flukes are in the liver Mr. Smith has no confidence 
in any cure, but believes that salt and dry food will maintain 
general health and may stave off the fatal issue. 
In Derbyshire the sheep census of 1880 shows a diminution 
of about 20,000, or a reduction, as compared with 1878, of 
about one-tenth of the total flocks of the county. This short- 
coming is mainly due to liver-rot, and, judging from the losses 
of the present winter, still greater diminution will be noticeable 
next summer. On the Mansfield sandy land attacks have been 
limited. They reach their maximum of extent and severity 
on the heavier clays and on the poorer dairy farms, where sheep 
are a secondary consideration, and where extraneous feeding is 
seldom used. The white-skinned sheep are sometimes stated 
to suffer most, but locality has much more to do with the 
prevalence of the disease than the breed. Mr. Richard Hall, 
Thulston, occupies a cold upland farm, and keeps 600 to 1000 
sheep ; he lost during 1879 about 25, and during 1880 double 
that number, these, however, have all been purchased sheep ; no 
sickness has yet appeared amongst the home-bred flock. The 
breeding ewes in August were sent from home to run over 400 
acres of stubble. Many of the cattle, alike home-bred and 
bought, are thriftless, doubtless infested by flukes ; several 
