12 BULLETIN 365, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
of poisoning are attributed to this plant, although the stockmen may 
have a very indefinite idea of what larkspur really is. In other 
cases, where they have learned that some other poisonous plant has 
been responsible for the death of animals, larkspur losses, without 
any doubt, are overlooked. Generally speaking, however, so far as 
the reported larkspur poisoning refers to the summer ranges in the 
mountains, considerable reliance can be put upon the facts presented. 
This is generally true where the losses refer to cattle rather than to 
sheep. 
The reports of Wilcox, 1897, and Chesnut and Wilcox, 1901, give 
some details with regard to losses of sheep in Montana, Wilcox 
stating that out of one band of 2,000 yearling lambs, 102 died. The 
authors, also, have been told by Mr. L. W. Bailey, of Casper, Wyo., 
that in the Big Horn region in 1908, 7,000 sheep were lost. Mr. Jeff. 
Crawford, of Casper, stated that in 1907, in the months of April, 
May, and June, he lost 23 per cent of his sheep. Both Mr. Bailey 
and Mr. Crawford supposed that the sheep died from larkspur 
poisoning. As is indicated eleswhere in this report, however, the 
authors very much doubt whether larkspur is ever the cause of 
fatalities in the case of sheep, so that in discussing larkspur losses it 
is felt that the sheep losses can be ignored. 
More complete reports of losses have been made from the State of 
Colorado than from any other region, largely, without doubt, be- 
cause the experiment work of the Department of Agriculture upon 
the larkspurs has been mainly centered in that State. Glover, 
1906, estimated that the annual losses among the Colorado cattle 
herds amounts to $40,000. A few concrete examples collected by the 
authors will give a more definite idea of what this loss means in in- 
dividual cases: 
Mr. Hartman, of Crystal Creek, Colo., reports that in 1881 or 
1885, on the Curecanti, out of 500 head of cattle, 35 died within 5 
hours. Mr. Creighton, of Crystal Creek, stated that out of one 
herd of 3,000, 200 died; and out of another of 5,000, 200 died, while 
from a herd of 6,000, 196 died. The latter fact was not an estimate, 
but was carefully tallied by one of the stockmen. In 1908, in Wash- 
ington Gulch, Gunnison County, Colo., 12 head of cattle were. found 
dead. In the same year in a gulch at the upper part of Eed Creek 
in the same county, 22 head of cattle died between 2 o'clock Satur- 
day, June 27, and 2 o'clock Sunday, June 28. In this case nearly all 
of the cattle belonged to one man. In District No. 4 of the Uncom- 
pahgre National Forest, in the spring of 1909, according to the re- 
port of Supervisor Spencer, 100 cattle died. Near Axial, Colo., in 
1908, Mr. lies lost 200 head of cattle. In the same year in an area of 
six or seven square miles near Axial, 25 head of cattle died out of 
a total of 800. One man in Del Xorte, Colo., was reported by the 
