CATTLE DISEASES.

Putaruru Press, Volume VII, Issue 269, 3 January 1929, Page 1

CATTLE DISEASES.

ADVICE TO DAIRY FARMERS. That mammitis anvngst dairy cows in the Manawatu and adjacent districts is more prevalent this season, is the opinion cf Mr R. H. Meade, Departmental veterinarian, of Palmerston North, expressed to a Manawatiu Daily Times reporter. There was no special reason for the greater number of cases reported—the simple facts that the scourge was taking its toil and apparently all the various endeavours that were being made to cure and prevent the disease had been of little use.

Mr Meade was very emphatic that farmers could do a great deal more than they were doing to help their herds resist attacks of all diseases by building up their constitutions. The fact that cows called upon every ounce of ifneir strength and energy to produce milk, was generally recognised by farmers to-day and efforts to keep the animal were being made in the direetk n of better pastures

and top dressing. There the matter should not be aliowe to rest, however. His experience is well as that of others, had been that splendid results could be obtained from the use of a lime preparation fed direct to the cow per medium of a dry mash or mixed with a palatable fodder such as bran. A compound that had functioned well in this respect was precip tated calcium fed at the rate of a dessertspoonful twice a -day. The powder could be mixed up with bran and fed in the bails during milking time. Mr Meade quoted instances of almost miraculous headway made by down and out animals after starting the calcium phosphate treatment! Much of the failure of cows to held was the result of low constitution, and there again the artificial feeding, if adopted, would effect a speedy cure.

Talking of pigs, Mr Meade roundly condemned the practice of many farmers of rushing pigs to market as soon as it was discovered they were diseased or had something wrong with them. People who did that should be open to prosecution with % heavy penalty, as it only meant thj the question <ff disease was disseminated about the count oral instances of farmers this had come under his