Symptoms.—The animals lie down a great part of the time. Feet hot and tender and if made to walk they do so with great difficulty. One or all four feet may become affected, although it is more frequently found in the front feet. The temperature is somewhat elevated, varying from 104° to 106° F., breathing very rapid, appetite fairly good and there will be great thirst. Founder in cows reduces the milk secretion, owing to the great fever that is present.
Treatment.—Apply cold packs to the feet, ice packs preferred. If the animal can be made to stand in a stream of water having a soft bottom, it, perhaps, is the best method of cooling off the feet. Give a physic of Aloin, three drams; Pulv. Gentian Root, two drams. Place in a gelatin capsule and give with capsule gun. To their drinking water add two or three drams of Potassi Nitrate three or four times daily. Animals suffering with Founder should be provided with soft ground to stand on, as their feet will be tender and subject to the chronic form of the disease.
GARGET.
(Congestion of the Udder)
Cause.—Very common in heavy milkers before or just after calving when the bag is very much enlarged and very sensitive; exposure to chill or standing in drafts or even neglected for too long a time in milking. Injuries may also cause Garget.
Symptoms.—The bag is very much enlarged, showing signs of inflammation. The swelling extends well forward following the milk veins. The cow has great difficulty in walking due to sensitiveness of the bag. When milked for two or three days the swelling disappears after the secretion is fully established, but as a rule is tinged with blood. Sometimes small clots of milk or cheese-like particles are ejected with the milk.
Treatment.—Give a physic consisting of Aloin, two drams; Pulv. Ginger, three drams. Place in gelatin capsule and give with capsule gun: Hyposulphite of Soda, sixteen ounces; Nitrate of Potassi, four ounces. Mix and make into sixteen powders. Give one powder three times a day in drinking water or place in gelatin capsule and give with capsule gun. Also dissolve Bichloride of Mercury, two grains; Boracic Acid, two drams, in one quart of boiling hot water. When this solution cools to about blood temperature, after stripping all milk fluid or pus from the affected teat or teats, inject with an ordinary bulb injection syringe after placing a teat tube into the end from which the air escapes when the bulb is pressed. Now, place the end of the syringe retaining the teat tube in the affected teat, the other end place in a bottle or vessel containing the solution and gently press the bulb and inject about a pint of the solution in each affected quarter. Leave the solution in the teat for only fifteen to twenty minutes and milk out thoroughly. Repeat this treatment two or three times a day.
For an external application the following ointment has given remarkably good results: Blue Ointment and Zinc Ointment, equal parts. Mix well and apply two or three times daily.
HARD MILKERS.
Cause.—A thickness or contraction of the mucous membranes lining the teat, or growths inside the teat.