Contagious foot-rot in sheep / by G.T. Brown.

  • George Thomas Brown
Date:
1892
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Contagious foot-rot in sheep / by G.T. Brown. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    history it was believed that the disease would appear if the sheep were placed under favourable conditions. Accordingly, they were penned on a pasture on a clay soil, and the want of rain was as far as possible compensated by constantly watering the ground. Two healthy sheep were put in the same pen with these sheep, and kept with them till the end of the third week in June without any result. All four sheep remained free from disease. On November 11 of the same year a well-defined case of foot-rot was obtained and sent to the College, where it was put on grass with two perfectly healthy sheep. After about three weeks' exposure both the sheep became lame in one hind foot. The diseased sheep was much worse. Association of the animals was maintained until the middle of February, 1891, when the disease had practically ceased to exist. The diseased sheep and those in contact had recovered, and were perfectly sound. It is worthy of remark that during the whole time that this experi- ment was carried on the weather was generally dry. In the early part of 1891 further experiments were con- ducted at Harrow and at Denham on a much larger scale than any which had been attempted previously. In the Harrow district the soil is stiff clay, and the difficulty was to find a pasture which had not become contaminated. At last an orchard was secured on which no sheep had been grazed certainly for many years past, and two diseased sheep from the neighbourhood of Maidstone, which were sent by Mr. C. Whitehead, were used for the experiment. Foot-rot in these animals was fully deve- loped in a perfectly typical form. In the pasture at Harrow three pens were constructed. In No. 1 pen in the first week in April were placed the two diseased Kentish ewes, one sound Welsh sheep, and three sound tegs; whilst in No. 2 pen were placed two half-bred tegs, and in No. o pen two Welsh ewes. Owing to the absence of rain the experimental pasture was in a very dry condition until the last week of May. During this period the sheep's feet were frequently examined and nothing was found amiss with them, but rain having fallen for several days in succession towards the end of May the pasture became thoroughly soaked, and almost immediately afterwards signs of foot-rot were apparent. On June 2 the Welsh ewe in No. 1 pen was noticed to be lame on its left front foot. On the following day it was caught and the foot examined, when it was observed that the skin of the interdigital space was much inflamed, and that suppuration -existed at the upper border of both claws at the interdigital space, whilst the leg immediately above the hoof was swollen and
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