The Brandon news. (Brandon, Miss.) 1892-1961, 1910-04-21
TICK ERADICATION.

Hon. @. H. Afford, member of the leg
islature from Pike ccuny, introduced and
secured the passage of the following bill,
as companion to his forty thousand dol
lar appropriation bill for the state live
stock sanitary board:
Be it enacted by the Legislature of the
state of Mississippi, That the boards of
supervisors in the various counties of the
state are hereby authorized and empowered
to appropriate money out Of the general
fund of he county to be used for the
fund of the county to be used for the
purpose of cooperating with the Missis-
sippi live stock sanitary board and the
United States department of agriculture,
bureau of animals industry, in eradicating
the cattle tick and preventing contagious,
infectious and communicable diseases in
live sock"
In discussing the bill today he said
"The passage of this bill means that a
new era of genuine prosperity will be
ushered in. The eradication of the cattle
tick and the prevention of contagious, in
fectious and communicable diseases in live
stock will more than offset the bad effects
of the boil weevil. The eradication of
the cattle tick and the Development of
ter balanced system of farming-one that
include more crops to enrich instead of
wear out our land; one that will include
more live stock to consume the surplus
farm products and leguminous crops that
must be grown to enrich the land and to
make manure to still further enrich the land
Good live stock is the foundation of
successful farming in every country of
the world. The old one crop system means
a poor soil, and poor soil means poor
people, and a poor people means bad
roads, uncomfortable homes, poorly equipp-
ed farms, very little education, the credit
system and in fact all that retards civili-
cation. Nothing will SO enrich the price
Of land and increase the price of land
and increase the revenue of the farmer
as will the eradication of the cattle
tick, ard the consequent development of
the live stock industry.
The cattle tick sucks the blood and
irritates the skin of animals kills many
cattle by tick fever, and causes the United
state government to impose quarantine
which lowers the price of cattle about one
cent a pound. Cattle immune from the
tick fever suffer very serious drain on
account of the large amount of blood
drawn from them by the tick. When
a Mississippi farmer ships a load of
cattle to the northern market, they are
unloaded into quarantine pens, and class
ed as tick infested ANIMALS, and must
be sold for immediate slaughter at about
ore cent less per pound than is given for
cattle of like quality from above the
quarantine line We lose annually from
tick fever more than two and one-half
million dollars worth of cattle.
Our mild winter, luxuriant grass crops,
and leguminous crops make Mississippi
-eminently suited to live stock farming.
man in this state give his hearty support
in tie eradication of the cattle tick? Let
us all urge our boards of supervisors
to make a liberal appropriation for this
work.
Prof. A. Smith, agricultural college,
Mississippi, is the secretary of the State
Live Stock Sanitary Board, and will be
pleased to give all necessary information
with reference to this work.