The Farmer's Veterinarian: A Practical Treatise on the Diseases of Farm Stock

by Charles William Burkett

INFLAMMATION OF THE LUNGS.

—This is a common disease in farm stock. The disease occurs most frequently in late fall or winter or early spring, and is due to exposure while the animal is still warm and hot; bad ventilation influences it. Authorities now generally believe it to be a germ disease and infectious. One of the first things noticed is the shivering of the animal and then a fevered condition; the animal seems to be hot, then cold; a peculiar breathing is noticed; the pulse quickens, ranges from 60 to 70 beats a minute; the eyelids on the inside take a scarlet hue. The animal does not eat, stands up much of the time with the head down and the ears lopped over; a grating sound is noticed when the ear is placed to the chest. Frequently distress is experienced in the bowels; constipation follows and the temperature rises gradually until it reaches 105 degrees, which is reached about the sixth or seventh day. If recovery does not follow the appetite will disappear, the mouth become cold, the breath heavy and disagreeable and the pulse feeble, frequently not noticeable at all.

After the case assumes a more favorable aspect, an effort should be made to keep the animal comfortable and in as good condition as possible. It is therefore advisable to keep it well blanketed, the legs bandaged and rubbed. The patient should be kept also in a warm stall where good air is available. Good food that is nourishing and easily digested should be provided. Sweet milk is good, and raw eggs mixed in the gruel are excellent also. A compress over the lungs does much good. The compress should be made out of heavy cloth, frequently rinsed in cold water and then placed over the lungs where they are covered with heavy, dry cloths. On recovery, rub the sides of the chest so as to thoroughly dry the surface. A mustard plaster, after the compress has been removed, is quite generally used. A stimulating medicine may be given during the early stages. Use a drench, consisting of 8 tablespoonfuls of whiskey to 4 tablespoonfuls of sweet spirits of niter. If the animal is in very great distress, give a drench every two or three hours consisting of 8 to 10 drops of Fleming’s tincture of aconite, 2 tablespoonfuls of laudanum mixed with a pint of cold water.

After the animal is on the road to recovery, stop the use of these medicines and give a tonic consisting of nitrate of potash or saltpeter and ground gentian root, half and half. Give a teaspoonful three times a day. While the animal is sick, a little boiled flaxseed mixed with a soft food will keep the bowels regular. It is not wise to give purgatives, hence it is wise to give an injection consisting of warm soapy water, so as to empty the bowels. From two to four weeks of rest and care should be allowed for complete recovery.

INFLUENZA.

—A specific disease of the horse affecting the mucous membrane of the air passages. When the mucous membrane of the eyelids is affected, pink eye results. Sometimes the mucous membrane of the intestines is affected, in which case colic or inflammation of the bowels results. The common cause is exposure to cold. If no work be required, plenty of fresh air be supplied, no drafts admitted and careful nursing otherwise, the disease will run its course in from two to three weeks and no medicines will be necessary. In cases where considerable cough prevails, the custom of putting a piece of camphor about the size of an egg in a pail of boiling water and holding the horse’s head over it from a quarter to a half hour at a time is to be commended. The bowels should be kept free and open. Any of the ordinary purgatives will do. If weakness occurs, give 4 tablespoonfuls each of tincture of ginger, ground gentian root and sweet spirits of niter in a half pint of water three times a day. Two tablespoonfuls of nitrate of potassium given once or twice each day in the drinking water is also desirable. As the trouble abates, the medicines suggested before may be dropped and in their place a teaspoonful of sulphate of iron and a tablespoonful of ground gentian root may be given daily in a bran mash or oatmeal gruel.

INTESTINAL WORMS IN HORSES.

—Intestinal worms may be classed as large and small. The large worms inhabit the small intestines, and the small ones the large intestines, the larger class of worms being more readily reached by worm destroyers than are the smaller ones, as the small intestines begin at the stomach and as remedies leave the stomach, the worm soon receives the dose prepared for it, while if one dose has to pass through about 60 feet of intestines before reaching the smaller worms in the larger intestines, much of the worm remedy is lost by mingling with the food, and diluted by mixing with the digestive fluids. Thus what is a remedy for the large species of worms will have little effect upon the smaller ones.

As a farmer’s dose for the larger species of worms, none, perhaps, is better than the following: Oil of turpentine, 2 ounces; extract or oil of male fern, one half ounce, mixed with 4 ounces of castor oil and 8 ounces of pure raw linseed oil, with half a pint of new milk, and given after the horse has fasted for about 14 hours. Repeat the dose in a week; then follow with two worm powders, common smoking tobacco, eight ounces; powdered worm seed, 6 ounces; powdered sulphate of iron, 4 ounces; mix with one-half pound each of salt and granulated sugar. Every morning before the horse is fed any other food, place a heaping tablespoonful of the powder in four quarts of wet wheat bran and allow the horse to eat it; continue for ten days and the horse will be practically rid of worms of the larger species. Colts should receive smaller doses in proportion to age.

The small worms need the worm powder to be given in the wheat bran every morning for fully two weeks. Then follow with an ounce dose of barbadoes aloes and a tablespoonful of ginger given by mixing with about 12 ounces of warm water and a gill of common molasses; wait a week and repeat the powder treatment and follow with the aloes. In a case of the very small or rectal worms (pin worms) always use rectal injections, a good enema being made by steeping for two hours one pound of quassia chips in a gallon of soft water; strain and add two ounces of common hard soap; use the whole at once, using at about blood temperature after the soap has dissolved. Repeat in three days and continue as long as worms are being brought away by the enemas.