Contagious Foot-rot in Sheep. 
289 
January 2, 1892, Pen C, teg and lamb. — Teg remained free 
from disease. Lamb, off fore hoof ragged at bottom ; off bind foot, 
horny gi’owth above digits ; slight evidence of foot-rot. Diseased 
teg in pen by itself had the off hind hoof still bad ; off fore foot, 
rotten sole ; near fore foot better. Little paddock, the lamb 
(from gi’azing meadow) had the hoofs a little cracked at bottom, 
no sign of foot-rot. 
April 2, Pen A. — Foot perfectly recovered. April 26, 
killed ; sound. 
Pen C. — Teg and lamb quite sound. 
April 22. — Both killed, feet sound. Lamb from grazing 
meadow now on cricket ground, where foot-rot prevailed last 
summer, sound yet. 
May 25. — This animal had been running with several sheep 
affected with chronic foot-rot since last summer, but did not 
yet show any signs of disease. 
From these and other experiments the following conclusions 
may be drawn : — ■ 
(1) So far as the evidence goes it justifies the statement 
that foot-rot is a contagious disease ; the infective matter 
being active when brought in contact with the skin between the 
claws, or when introduced into the system by inoculation, and 
probably when taken in by the mouth from contaminated 
pastures. 
(2) That it cannot be produced by long-continued exposure 
to undrained moist soils with an abundant coarse and wet 
herbage. 
(3) That animals exposed to these conditions for many 
months, and resisting entirely the influences named above, 
contract foot-rot in from fourteen to twenty-one days on being 
placed among sheep suffering from the disease. 
(4) Sheep affected with foot-rot may improve, and from 
time to time become worse ; and finally may recover and present 
a perfectly healthy condition of foot, notwithstanding that they 
have been kept the whole period under the conditions which in- 
duced the disease. 
(5) That the contagium of foot-rot remains for some time 
in the system (ten to twenty days and longer) without any 
indication of disease appearing in the skin between the claws. 
An infected sheep may therefore escape detection even by an 
expert, and may introduce foot-rot into a sound flock. 
Lastly, the question arises as to the possibility of sheep con- 
tracting foot-rot by taking the infective matter into the system 
during feeding on an infected pasture. It must, of course, 
happen in a pasture on which sheep affected with foot-rot aro 
