LOOAL EXPERIENCES.

Otago Witness, Issue 1555, 27 August 1881, Page 7

LOOAL EXPERIENCES.

[The experiences of our readers are cordially invited for publication in this column. We have no doubt whatever that if our farmers would only respond freely to our invitation many useful hints would be placed before our readers lohich are at present confined to a limited number. Communications should reach our office not later than the Tuesday morning proceeding the day of publication, or they may have lo be held over uutit the succeeding week.]

Worms in the Intestines of Lambs.

The disease to which lambs are subject (worms in the bronchial tubes) is far more prevalent than sheepowners are aware of. The action of the worms on the constitution brings on scour, and at this stage the farmer sees that something is wrong, and gives them a change of feed if he can ; but still the skins on the wire fence keep on increasing. You ask him what is wrong with the sheep : " Can't make it out ; they are scouring badly with me this year. I don't know what to do with them. Now this lamb I am now skinning was a real good one. About a week ago I saw it coughing as I was driving it into this paddock for a bit of a change ; it took the scour, and this is the end of it." Now if the farmer had, after finishing the skinning, run his knife along the windpipe, splittine it open from end to end, and examined the inside of the pipe and the small tubes leading into the lungs, he would have seen a number of worms like pieces of fine white threads, and understood why the lamb coughed, scoured, and died. I have heard of a number of cures— among the rest fumes of sulphur and one teaspoonful of turpentine in a tableapoonful of linseed oil. But if we have to use these cures with large flocks of lambs, I for one would prefer the disease, at least to that cure -if it is a But " prevention is better than cure." Let us try to - find out the came, and the conditions favourable to the development of the disease ; and when these arc known, we may be able to avoid them. If every, flockowner (those who have diseased flocks and those who have not) were to write to you stating whether their sheep were affected, and the treatment they have been receiving in respect to food, whether on rich, medium, or poor artificial grass, tussocks, or turnips ; whether the paddocks were damp or dry, and any other facts that might bear on the subject, avoiding opinions unless the grounds for them are given too. The breed of the sheep should also be stated. ... .. . Now, Sir, if you could get this information and put it in the Witness we would all see it; or you might, stir up our sheep inspectors with your editorial long' pole or perhaps set "Civis" on to them and rouse' them up to try and do something for us in this mattar, in return for the 2s per hundred which they are so punctual in collecti»g as a sheep tax.

[We shall be only too glad to publish any information in the matter which may from time to time be forwarded to us.]