Milch Cows and Dairy Farming / Comprising the Breeds, Breeding, and Management, in Health and Disease, of Dairy and Other Stock, the Selection of Milch Cows, with a Full Explanation of Guenon's Method; The Culture of Forage Plants, and the Production of Milk, Butter, and Cheese: Embodying the Most Recent Improvements, and Adapted to Farming in the United States and British Provinces. With a Treatise upon the Dairy Husbandry of Holland; To Which Is Added Horsfall's System of Dairy Management

by Charles Louis Flint

Foul in the Foot.

—Cows and other stock, when fed in low, wet pastures, will often suffer from ulcers or sores, generally appearing first between the claws. This is commonly called foul in the foot, and is analogous to foot-rot in sheep. It is often very painful, causing severe lameness and loss of flesh, and discharges a putrid matter, or pus. Sometimes it first appears in the form of a swelling near the top of the hoof, which breaks and discharges foul matter.

The rough and common practice among farmers is to fasten the foot in the same manner as the foot of an ox is fastened in shoeing, and draw a rough rope back and forth over the ulcerated parts, so as to produce a clean, fresh wound, and then dress it with tar or other similar substance.

This is often an unnecessarily cruel operation. The loose matter may easily be removed by a knife, and then carefully wiped off with a moist sponge. The animal should then be removed at once to a warm, dry pasture, or kept in the barn.

If the case has been neglected till the pasterns become swollen and tender, the sore may be thoroughly cleansed out, and dressed with an ointment of sulphate of iron one ounce, molasses four ounces, simmered over a slow fire till well mixed. Apply on a piece of cotton batting, and secure upon the parts. If any morbid growth or fungus appear, use equal parts of powdered blood-root and alum sprinkled on the sore, and this will usually effect a cure.

Some also give a dose of flour of sulphur half an ounce, powdered sassafras-bark one ounce, and burdock two ounces, the whole steeped in a quart of boiling water, and strained when cool; and, if the matter still continues to flow from the sore, wash it morning and night with chloride of soda one ounce, or a tablespoonful of common salt dissolved in a pint of water.

Foul in the foot causes very serious trouble, if not taken in season. The health of cows is injured to a great extent. I have seen, during the present season, many instances of foul in the foot in dairy stock arising from the wetness of the pastures. No lameness in cattle should be neglected.