SHEEP DISEASES : CAUSES, NATURE AND PREVENTION. 357 
Iloose is due to a round worm (the Strongylus filarius ) which 
when mature resembles a piece of white thread and the female of 
which is about 1J to 2 inches long. It inhabits the wind-pipe 
and bronchial tubes, but its embryos gain access to the deeper 
parts of the lungs and there set up much irritation and patchy 
inflammation. 
In the lungs of thousands of sheep, not only native but Amer¬ 
ican also, killed in our slaughter-houses, numerous small nodules 
of a yellowish color and about the size of a millet seed are seen; 
these have often been mistaken for tubercle (consumption) but 
the microscope reveals the embryonic parasites in their interior. 
The development of the worm is not understood ; one thing, 
however, is certain, viz., that salt spread over the contaminated 
pastures is a sure preventive; drainage also is useful, but sheep 
should not, if it can be avoided, be put on infected fields. 
The lungs too of affected sheep should be destroyed instead, 
as is often the case, being sold or used as food for people or for 
cats. Cooking certainly kills the parasites if it is effectually 
carried out. 
Many sheep suffering from hoose die from debility induced 
by diarrhoea; others die from suffocation and many from conges¬ 
tion of the lungs, if exposed to a chill. 
Another round worm, the twisted strongyle (Strongylus con- 
tortus), is often the cause of great loss amongst sheep. It is a 
small worm like a piece of red thread and is found clinging, by 
the aid of barbs, to the membrane of the fourth stomach, there 
causing inflammation, diarrhoea, emaciation and death. 
It is most seen on old pasture land where there is plenty of 
fog for cover, and this fact points to the necessity of removing 
the fog from such pastures by burning or by chain-harrows. 
Top-dressing with lime or salt should also be practiced. 
The only tape-worm of importance found in the sheep is the 
taenia expansa , but it is questionable if it does much harm and I 
have seldom found it unassociated with other parasites. 
In conclusion, I would say that no man can be a successful 
sheep farmer unless he has some knowledge of the structure of 
the animals he deals with (histology) or of the functions of the 
