8 
DEATH OF SEVERAL ANIMALS FROM EATING ACORNS. 
I was fortunate to avoid the arteries of the bulb, &c., and 
do not suppose that a wineglass of blood was lost during the 
operation. 
DEATH OF SEVERAL ANIMALS FROM EATING 
ACORNS. 
By Edwin Taylor, M.R.C.V.S., Bury St. Edmunds. 
Seeing an account of several cases of poisoning by acorns 
in the Veterinarian for this month, I wish to add to them the 
record of several cases that have occurred in my practice. 
On October 14th I was requested to see fifteen young bul¬ 
locks about eighteen months old, the property of the Mayoress 
of Bristol, which were reported to be ill, and also two others 
that were then lying dead. The symptoms were great pros¬ 
tration of strength, dull and dejected appearance, ears cold 
and depressed, staring coat, pulse very feeble, and total loss of 
appetite. They were reported to have been ill two or three 
days; diarrhoea existed in all of them; the two that were 
dead had died during the previous night. 
They had all been in a large park which abounded with 
oak trees, and had been seen to eat acorns, therefore these 
were at once conjectured to be the cause of death by those 
in attendance. 
There was also in most of the bullocks a yellowish discharge 
from the eyes and nostrils, which might have led to the sup¬ 
position that the disease was cattle plague, had it occurred 
some time previously. In one or two there was a slight 
abrasion of the buccal membrane. 
post-mortem appearances were these: the lungs slightly 
congested, the heart covered with spots of ecchymosis, the 
rumen and all the other stomachs were more or less inflamed 
on their mucous coats, particularly the omasum, in which 
was floating several large clots of coagulated blood. The 
intestines throughout were also very much inflamed, ap¬ 
proaching to gangrene in places. In another bullock which 
afterwards died there was a large coagulum of blood on the 
outside of the rumen, firmly attached to the peritoneal coat, 
weighing between six and seven pounds. In another the 
mesentery was covered as thickly as possible with spots of 
ecchymosis. 
In all eleven animals died, and the post-mortem appearances 
were much the same in all. The treatment adopted was 
the exhibition of powerful stimulants and tonics combined 
