Marietta daily leader. (Marietta, Ohio) 1895-1906, 1900-11-27
PIP Is A PARASITE.
Valuable Discovery of a Young
woman Student.
Destructive Chicken Disease L,
Traced to n Worm That Affects
the Trachea of the Fowl
with Fatal Result.

with Fatal Result.
Women who have gone into the
chicken raising business and women
VINO want to go into it, the latter
forming decidedly the larger class,
will be proud of one of their sex who
has made discovery which proves
invaluable to poultry growers. Wom-
EN- have always had liking for this
industry, but have been discouraged
from entering it on account of it's
many stumbling blocks on the road to
success. One of the most impossible
of these was the pips, disease which
every year destroys fully half the
young chickens. No matter how well
they may be cared for or how thrifty
the stock may appear, the pips will
appear among them and in less than
a week thousands of them will be
dead. Any remedy so far tried has
proved unsuccessful because it has
never been known what the exact ma
ture of the disease is.
Miss Grace NJ. Norris, student at
the Syracuse medical college, recently
made the discovery that the pips is
the throat of the animal, choking it.,
says the Chicago Chronicle. The
worm is about half an inch long as
she found it and fastens itself to the
mucous membrane of the chickens
trachea, where it grows until it has
reached maturity, when it energies
from the mouth or nostrils of the
fowl and, falling to the ground, there
deposits it's ova and dies. A group
of these parasites lodged in the throat
will soon fill up the air passage, when
the chicken will open it's mouth to
pant and finally. unable to breathe
will die. 1t is from the ova deposit
on the ground that disease spreads.
The chickens scratching up the soil
set these eggs in motion and they are
breathed into the trachea, where they
soon mature. So rapid is the spread
of the disease that almost before it's
presence has been discovered all the
birds in the yard will be afflicted.
Once started it is almost impossible
will kill the fowl The only prevent
i've is to change the chickens from one
yard to another, thus giving time for
the publication of the soil If well
plowed the yard will soon become
clean again.
In talking of her discovery Miss Nor
ris recently said: 81 have always loved
animals and that is probably the rea-
son why 1 investigated this disease.
I visited last spring during my vaca-
tion at farm near Richfield Springs.
where a great number of fowls were
raised. l noticed that many of the
young chickens and turkeys were suf-
ferng from peculiar affection, which
caused them to open their mouths
and suddenly, when they were appar-
emily perfectly strong, die. The farm
ers said they had pips, but aside from
what 1 had observed they knew little
Of the disease and had been unsuc-
cessful in their attempts to overcome
it. For four months / did nothing
but study and experiment with the
disease. As a result / found that the
gaping was caused by the presence of
a parasite in the trachea. 1t is bright
pink color and about half an inch
long and twisted in shape. Near one
end it has long appendage, which
gives it forked appearance like the
letter Y. This appendage fastens itself
firmly to the mucous membrane of the
trachea, forming in masses, which close
the air passage and cause death.
"The worm is pointed at one end
where the mouth is located. 1 have
named the parasite the habita
trachena. There were an average OF
20 parasites in every fowl l examined
The only effective treatment l have
found is to keep the fowls on fresh
soil, where there are no eggs to be in.
hailed. Authorities have never agreed
as to the cause of the disease and for
this reason no effective remedy has
been found. A hooked wire apparatus
has been used but without success
The wire is run down the trachea and
in nearly every case the fowl dies as
result of the remedy. An old treat.
ment was to cut off the end of the
tongue, which naturally appears to be
diseased, showing dry and swollen anG
covered with scales. Anyone can see
how cruel and at the same time how
harmful this remedy would be-
Miss Norris is a student of medicine
in her second year at the Syracuse
college and has distinguished herself
by her work in biology and analytica,
dissection.