The comparative number of pure bred stallions licensed each year and their breeds follows:

NUMBER OF STALLIONS LICENSED

PRACTICAL FARM WORK

Sir: I have the honor to submit the following report:

The past season at the Farm of the State Livestock Sanitary Board has been a generally successful one, especially good crops of hay, wheat, corn, silage, carrots and turnips being harvested.

During the past year the number of cattle on the Farm has been materially reduced, while the stock of hogs has been increased to enable the Laboratory to meet the greater demands for hog cholera

serum.

The management of the Farm has assumed control of the boardinghouse for the farm hands, the house having been thoroughly renovated and refurnished throughout, and placed in the hands of a competent housekeeper.

The farm help has been organized with a working foreman in direct charge of all field and stock work, with a herdsman and helper, a hog man, and three teamsters under him.

The policy of placing out young bred dairy bulls, of which there are a limited number, in the hands of farmers, has been adopted,

and has already been taken advantage of in several instances. Care is taken to place these bulls in communities where they will be of most service in grading up the stock of these localities, without in any way interfering with the legitimate business of state breeders. In fact it is believed this practice will result in promoting a greater appreciation of pure bred sires, ultimately promoting the breeders sales.

Respectfully submitted,

To C. J. Marshall, State Veterinarian.

CARL W. GAY,

Director.

CONTAGIOUS AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES

Sir: I have the honor to submit the following report:

The principal contagious and infectious diseases that have occurred during the year are practically the same as met in previous years. They are actinomycosis, anthrax, blackleg, glanders, hog cholera, mange, rabies and Texas fever. (Tuberculosis is handled by another Division.)

ACTINOMYCOSIS

Animals afflicted with generalized actinomycosis are destroyed as worthless. Those that are afflicted with a mild form may be slaughtered under inspection, the diseased parts destroyed and the balance of the carcass used for food. The animal may be kept in quarantine and treated if the owner and agent deem it advisable to do so.

Berks,
Bradford,
Bucks,

Chester,

Erie,

Forest,

Lancaster,

McKean,

Montgomery,

Potter,

Susquehanna,

Tioga,

Warren,

Westmoreland,

ANTHRAX

Anthrax is not widely distributed in Pennsylvania. An occasional case only has been reported from fourteen counties. The disease is most common in sections of country surrounding tanneries. For the past few years the Board has recommended vaccination and done it at State expense on all bovine animals kept in localities where the disease has occurred in previous years. Very little trouble has resulted from the vaccination, and in no case has the disease occurred in herds after they have been vaccinated.

The vaccination should be done early in the spring before animals are turned on infected fields. They should not be turned out or exposed to this infection for at least two weeks after the vaccination is finished.

Owners are warned not to skin animals that have died suddenly or mysteriously in places where anthrax is known to exist. The carcass should be burned to ashes, if possible on the spot where the animal died. If this is not possible it should be buried under eight feet of earth. The body, the grave and territory around it should be well covered with quick lime and fenced off so no other animals can get to it.

Blackleg, or symptomatic anthrax, was reported and vaccinations performed in twenty-one counties. The disease is only met in young cattle or those under three to four years old. It can be entirely controlled by vaccination. Most stock owners can recognize the disease when it occurs on account of the rapid course, sure death and the black, tarry, frothy appearance of the flesh in certain portions of the body when the skin has been cut into or removed.

Following cination.

vac

In order to bring the attention of stock owners to the importance of vaccination against blackleg, notices are placed in the newspapers in sections of the State from which the disease has been reported in

previous years.

Local veterinarians can make the diagnosis and apply the vaccine, which is furnished, free of charge, by the Board.

Suspected cases of glanders were reported from eighteen counties during the year. A positive diagnosis was made in fourteen counties. One man in the State contracted the disease and died. Each positive case of the disease in horses has been disposed of in accordance with the rules and regulations of the Board. Veterinarians seldom make a mistake in diagnosing advanced cases of glanders, yet in nearly every instance it has been confirmed by the laboratory examination and all horses known to have been exposed to this infection were tested with mallein. In many cases the compliment fixation test, agglutination test and Strauss method, one or all have been applied to suspicious cases. Well marked physical cases and animals that react to the Strauss method are destroyed. Those that have been exposed and react to the other tests, but show no physical symptoms may be appraised and destroyed or kept under provisional quarantine and retested. This plan has been followed for years in Pennsylvania, and so far no trouble has arisen from reacting horses that show no physical symptoms of glanders.

Following vaccination.

Hog cholera was reported from forty-three counties. Four hundred and eleven droves, consisting of nine thousand, four hundred and sixty hogs and pigs were examined and four thousand, nine hundred and thirty-three were vaccinated. Over three thousand hogs had died in these herds before vaccination was applied and about the same number were found to be too sick to vaccinate. The State has given the serum treatment only in herds where the disease had broken out. Many requests were received to get it done before the disease was observed. This plan was followed because the period of immunity is short, lasts only about two to four months, and serum could not be made fast enough to treat herds already afflicted. The plant at the farm, where the vaccine is made, has been enlarged and perfected to such an extent that it is hoped that the supply in the future will be adequate to keep up with the demand and administer the serum promptly when the disease is first recognized.

In most cases the diagnosis can be made and the serum applied by the local veterinarian. Agents of the Board were sent to sections of the State in which there was no veterinarian, or where he had had no experience with the disease or this form of treatment. The agent, in addition to diagnosing and treating the case, instructed the local man where necessary in the use of the serum. Unusually good results have been obtained in all parts of the State from the use of hog cholera serum. In nearly every case the outbreak has been checked and no further losses sustained after the treatment was applied.