CURES FOR BLOATING

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume LXIX, Issue LXIX, 4 September 1915, Page 2

CURES FOR BLOATING

Remedies for "blown" cattle are discussed in a recent issue of the Australasian, an extract from which reads: ''The trocar and cannula are the usual remedies; but simpler methods have been proved efficacious by stockowners. A couple of years ago was noticed in our columns the method of a well-known dairyman on an irrigation settlement, who administered two table spoonfuls of kerosene in a pint of milk to cows blown on lucerne, and promoted the release of the gases formed inside the animal by keeping the mouth open with a piece of wood fastened asross it. Some 'experiments carried out at the Kentucky Experiment Station have led the authorities there to recommend as a speedy cure for bloating the use of one quart of 4 per cent solution of formalin. A block of avoocl is placed in the mouth to keep it open, and the animals are said to recover in less than half an hour. The quantities given are 1 l-3oz of formalin in a quart of water. The American quart weighs about 21b, instead of 2jlb, as in our system of measures, so that the amount of formalin needed to make a 4 per cent solution will be nearly ]ioz to the quart of water. The American investigators demonstrated that clover and lucerne blossoms contain large quantities of, sugar, varying f rO jn 3.6 per cent by weight in red clover blossoms to 2.8 \ per cent in lucerne blossoms. The blossoms also, contain a wild yeast, which, under suitable conditions, rapidly ferments the sugar, producing large quantities of carbon-dioxide gas. It was then considered that a powerful aittiseptic, like formalin, should control the situation, and a Jersey cow bloated from eating clover blossoms, when drenched with the above solution! recovered completely in 20 minutes."'