The miners' express. (Dubuque, Iowa) 1849-1854, 1850-08-21

Value saved on farm of Bowerhope E164 0 0
BRAxY IN SHEEp.-This disease of which we
find many traces in our Western hocks during
the Winter, receives notice in such manner as
will be useful to be considered:
Indigestion is the primary cause, exciting con-
stipation, which sets up acute inflammation of the
bowels, and causes death. The indigestion, is
occasioned by sudden change from succulent
to dry food; and the sudden change is impelled
by the sudden appearance of snow conceaing
the green heritage the sheep were eating, oblig-
ing them to subsist upon the tops of old heather,
and the dried twigs and leaves of the bushes
that overtop the snow. By this account of the
origin of the disease, it is obvious that were
llls provided for shelter, and turnips for food
the braxy would never affect young hillsheep.
The Ettrick Shepherd thus describes its symp-
toms:-ssThe loss of cud is the first token. AS
the distemper advances, the agony with which
the animal is suffering becomes more visible.
When it stands, it brings all its four feet into
the compass Of foot; and sometimes it contn-
ues to rise and lie down alternately every two
or three minutes. The eyes are heavy and dull,
and deeply impressive of its distress. The ears
hang down, and when more narrowly inspected
the mouth and tongue are dry and parched, and
the white fthe eye infamed. -. The bel
ly is prodigiously swelled, even 50 much that ii
sometimes bursts. All the different parts of the
stomach are infamed in some degree" Violent
inflammation succeeds with tendency to mortif
cation and sinking, so that, after speedy death
the stencil of the viscera, and even of the car.
that hog apparently we'll in the evening will
be found dead in the morning.
Cure thus seems almost unavailable, and yet
it may be effected, provided the symptoms are
observed in time; when if blood is drawn freely
from any part of the body, as from hicks made
der the eye, and that behind the EARN, and a
dose of salts administered in warm water, the
animal will most probably recover.
But the grand object is prevention of the dis
ease, by timely supply of succulent food; ane
If turnips cannot be obtained, it may be worth the
should not be provided and given along will
hay, during storm. The laxative property o
o-cakes is well established, & it's carriage to the
remotest hill-farm comparatively easy. Mr.
Fairbairn recommends the use of salt to young
sheep, when shifted suddenly from fresh tt
dry food; and as q condiment it would prove
beneficial, in the case of ruminants, as cattle
and sheep, the structure of whose digestive or
gans renders them peculiarly susceptible of indi
0estion; and on this account it would be val
ulble assistant to the more nutricious oil cake
Instead ofentirely acquiescing in Ettrick Sheph.
erds recommendation s'to pasture the young
and old Of the focks all together, las has been
done in Peeblesshire, to the eradication it is said
Of the braxy,--as being in many cases imprac-
ticable and attended with no profit, Mr.. Fair.
BARN suggests, "Let the pasture for hirsel
be as nearly as possible of one soil. To over
look this is mighty error, and the surest means
Of making the flock unequal. The heath should
also be regularly burned, and the sheep never
allowed to pasture long upon soft grass" but
put them on turnips, as "infallible antidote a.
gainst the progress ofthe malady,' which he
has tsinyariably found to give setting stroke to
the disease.
The Ettrick Shepherd mentions the existence
of kinds Of braxy, namely the bo,oeI sickness,
the sickness i. The flesh and 5lood, the dry
brazy, and the scatsr trazy all originating In the
cause above described, and Of a class Of diseases
allied in their nature to hoyen in cattle, and
fatulent collie or bottsi in horses.
Prairie Farmer