This is an inflammation of the mucous membrane, which lines the nasal
passages, and it sometimes extends to the larynx and pharynx. In the
first instance--where the lining of the nasal passages is alone and not
very violently affected--it is merely accompanied by an increased
discharge of mucus, and is rarely attended with much danger. In this
form, it is usually termed _snuffles_; and high-bred English
mutton-sheep, in this country, are apt to manifest more or less of it,
after every sudden change of weather. When the inflammation extends to
the mucous lining of the larynx and the pharynx, some degree of fever
usually supervenes, accompanied by cough, and some loss of appetite. At
this point, bleeding and purging are serviceable.
Catarrh rarely attacks the American fine-woolled sheep with sufficient
violence in summer to require the application of remedies. Depletion, in
catarrh, in our severe winter months, however, rapidly produces that
fatal prostration, from which it is almost impossible to bring the sheep
back, without bestowing an amount of time and care upon it, costing far
more than the worth of an ordinary animal.
The best course is to _prevent_ the disease by judicious precaution.
With that amount of attention which every prudent farmer should bestow
on his sheep, the American Merino is but little subject to it. Good,
comfortable, and well-ventilated shelters, constantly accessible to the
sheep in winter, with a sufficiency of food regularly administered, are
usually a sufficient safeguard.
MALIGNANT EPIZOOeTIC CATARRH.
[Illustration: AN ENGLISH RACK FOR FEEDING SHEEP.]
Essentially differing, in type and virulence, from the preceding, is an
epidemic, or, more properly speaking, an epizooetic malady, which, as
often as once in every eight or ten years, sweeps over extended sections
of the Northern States, destroying more sheep than all other diseases
combined. It commonly makes its appearance in winters characterized by
rapid and violent changes of temperature, which are spoken of by the
farmers as "bad winters" for sheep. The disease is sometimes termed the
"distemper," and also, but erroneously, "grub in the head." The winter
of 1846-7 proved peculiarly destructive to sheep in New York, and some
of the adjoining States; some owners losing one-half, others
three-quarters, and a few seven-eighths, of their flocks. One person
lost five hundred out of eight hundred; another, nine hundred out of a
thousand. These severe losses, however, mainly fell on the holders of
the delicate Saxons, and perhaps, generally, on those possessing not the
best accommodations, or the greatest degree of energy and skill.
_Symptoms._ The primary and main disease, in such instances, is a
species of catarrh; differing, however, from ordinary catarrh in its
diagnosis, and in the extent of the lesions accompanying both the
primary and the symptomatic diseases. The animals affected do not,
necessarily, at first show any signs of violent colds, as coughing,
sneezing, or labored respiration; the only indications of catarrh
noticed, oftentimes, being a nasal discharge. Animals having this
discharge appear dull and drooping; their eyes run a little, and are
partially closed; the caruncle and lids look pale; their movements are
languid, and there is an indisposition to eat; the pulse is nearly
natural, though at times somewhat too languid. In a few days these
symptoms are evidently aggravated; there is rapid emaciation,
accompanied with debility; the countenance is exceedingly dull and
drooping; the eye is kept more than half closed; the caruncle, lids,
etc., are almost bloodless; a gummy, yellow secretion about the eye;
thick, glutinous mucus adhering in and about the nostrils; appetite
feeble; pulse languid; and muscular energy greatly prostrated. They
rapidly grow weaker, stumble, and fall as they walk, and soon become
unable to rise; the appetite grows feebler; the mucus at the nose is, in
some instances, tinged with dark, grumous blood; the respiration becomes
oppressed; and the animals die within a day or two after they become
unable to rise. Upon a _post-mortem_ examination, the mucous membrane
lining the whole nasal cavity is found highly congested and thickened
throughout its entire extent, accompanied with the most intense
inflammation; slight ulcers are found on the membranous lining, at the
junction of the cellular ethmoid bones with the cribriform plate, in the
ethmoidal cells; and the inflammation extends to the mucous membrane of
the pharynx, and some inches, from two to four, of the upper portion of
the [oe]sophagus.
No sheep, affected with this disease, recovers after emaciation and
debility have proceeded to any great extent. In the generality of
instances, the time, from the first observed symptoms until death,
varies from ten to fifteen days; although death, in some cases, results
more speedily.
_Treatment._ Nothing has been found so serviceable as mercury, which,
from its action on the entire secretory system, powerfully tends to
relieve the congested membranes of the head. Dissolve one grain of
bi-chloride of mercury--corrosive sublimate--in two ounces of water; and
give one-half ounce of the water, or one-eighth of a grain of corrosive
sublimate, daily, in two doses. To stimulate and open the bowels, give,
also, rhubarb in a decoction, the equivalent of ten or fifteen grains at
a dose, accompanied with the ordinary carminative and stomachic
adjuvants, ginger and gentian in infusion.