12 NORTH AMERICAN PEVEB TICK AND OTHEB SPECIES. 
the north and of the northern breeder to exhibit his in the tick area is 
a handicap, the importance of which will be readily seen. 
5. The necessary restriction- in the shipping of southern cattle 
also handicap the breeder and ailed the price. 
(i. The maintenance of the quarantine involves considerable annual 
expense for the protection of the cattle owners north of the line. 
7. Minor losses may be grouped as follows: (a) In Texas, especially, 
the tick induces the attack of the screw-worm fly (ChryeoTnyia m<ic<I- 
hii'ii! Fab.)j (b) there seems to be, as pointed out by Mr. Mayer, a 
considerable interference with the fecundity of infested cows: (c) the 
railroads are put to the expense of disinfecting car- and maintaining 
separate pens and the stockman to the expense of dipping — items 
which react on the price that southern cattle bring. 
All the losses that have been mentioned total approximately 
$100,000,000 each year. At present the loss, as indicated by Doctor 
Mohler, amounts annually to at least 10 per cent of the value of the 
cattle. The quality of the animals is the lowest and the loss is great esl 
in the regions where the natural conditions without the tick should 
produce the finest cattle with the least loss. But the damage may be 
better expressed by the statement that the tick makes profitable 
production practically impossible in the South. Any successful 
system of agriculture must rest upon a diversification of crops, and 
this, in turn, depends upon animal husbandry to maintain the fertility 
of the soil. Therefore, until the tick is eradicated or placed under 
control, a rational system of agriculture in the infested area is out of 
the question, and that achievement would mean almost as much to 
the North as to the South. 
THE LIFE HISTORY OF TICKS IN GENERAL. 
The following general statement regarding the life history of ticks 
is taken from Salmon and Stiles : a 
Ticks arc temporary parasites, attacking mammals. birds, and reptiles. They do 
not appear to be so strictly confined to certain hosts as do parasites in general. Still. 
this may be more of an apparent than a real rule. Certain it is that, although a given 
ti'k may he found occasionally on animals which are very dissimilar (dog ticks have, 
for instance, been found on Bnakes), -iill the various species show a decided predilec- 
t ion for certain ho~i~. 
The parasites copulate during the period of parasitism h and suck the blood from 
their hosts. The female grows to a large size and eventually drops to the ground and 
" Seventeenth Ann. Rept. bureau of Animal Industry. U. S. Dept. Agric, p. 398. 
& This is not invariable. Amblyomma americanum sometimes copulates — o after 
the second molt, but before ii has gained a host. It is likely that other species also 
lonally do so.— W. D. II. and W. A. H. 
