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 AGRICULTURE

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55 it 56 Viet. c. 47, power was given to the Board of Agriculture to use the sums voted on account of pleuropneumonia for paying the costs involved in dealing with foot-and-mouth disease; under this Act the Board could order the slaughter of diseased animals and of animals in contact with these, and could pay compensation for animals so slaughtered. Under the provisions of the Contagious Diseases (Animals) Act, 1893 (56 & 57 Viet, c. 43) swine fever in Great Britain was, from 1st November in that year, dealt with by the Board of Agriculture in the same way as pleuro-pneumonia, the slaughter of infected swine being carried out under directions from the central authority, and compensation allowed from the imperial exchequer. In 1894 was passed the Diseases of Animals Act (57 & 58 Viet. c. 57), the word “ contagious ” being omitted from the title. This was a measure to consolidate the Contagious Diseases (Animals) Acts, 1878 to 1893. In it “ the expression ‘ disease ’ means cattle plague (that is to say, rinderpest, or the disease commonly called cattle plague), contagious pleuro-pneumonia of cattle (in this Act called pleuro-pneumonia), foot-and-mouth disease, sheep-pox, sheep-scab, or swine fever (that is to say, the disease known as typhoid fever of swine, soldier purples, red disease, hog cholera or swine plague).” The Diseases of Animals Act, 1896 (59 & 60 Viet. c. 15)—the last of the series of such Acts passed in the 19th century— rendered compulsory the slaughter of imported live stock at the place of landing, a boon for which British stockbreeders had striven for many years. The ports in Great Britain at which foreign animals may be landed are Bristol, Cardiff, Glasgow, Hull, Liverpool, London, Manchester, and Newcastle-upon-Tyne. Animals from the Channel Islands may be landed at Southampton. The Diseases of Animals. Under the Diseases of Animals Acts, 1894 and 1896, weekly returns are issued by the Board of Agriculture of outbreaks of anthrax, foot-and-mouth disease, glanders (including farcy), pleuro-pneumonia, rabies, and swine fever in the counties of Great Britain; also monthly returns of outbreaks of sheep-scab. There is a popular notion that tuberculosis is included amongst the diseases scheduled under the Diseases of Animals Acts, but this is not (1901) the case. Cattle plague, or rinderpest, has not been recorded in Great Britain since 1877. In that year there were 47 outbreaks distributed over five counties, and involving 263 head of cattle. The course of foot-and-mouth disease in Great Britain between 1877 and 1900 inclusive is told in Table XXII., Table Outbreaks of Foot-and-Mouth Disease in Great Britain, 1877 to 1900. Animals attacked. Counties. Outbreaks. 1877 1878 1879 1880 1881 1882 1883 1884 1885 1886 1892 1893 1894 1900

55 45 29 38 49 49 75 55 10 1 15 2 3 9

858 235 137 1,461 4,833 1,970 18,732 949 30 1 95 2 3 21

Cattle. 5,640 912 261 20,918 59,484 23,973 219,289 12,186 354 10 1,248 30 7 214

Sheep.

Swine. Animals.

7,405 2,099 8,609 245 15,681 5 9,572 1,886 117,152 6,330 11,412 2,564 217,492 24,332 14,174 1,860 30 34 3,412

2 80 1 32 1

107

261 50

from which the years 1887 to 1891 and 1895 to 1899,

197

both inclusive, are omitted, because there was no outbreak during those periods. The disease is seen to have attained its maximum virulence in 1883. Sheep-scab, a loathsome skin disease due to an acarian parasite, is in a most unsatisfactory position in Great Britain. Table XXIII. shows the number of outbreaks, Table XXIII.—Outbreaks of Sheep-Scab in Great Britain, 1877 to 1900. Year. Counties. Outbreaks. Year. Counties. Outbreaks. 3214 1889 75 1207 77 187V 1890 75 1506 75 2335 1878 80 1891 2250 83 2229 1879 1892 82 2821 70 1556 1880 86 2603 2055 1893 1881 77 84 1894 2811 78 2234 1882 88 3092 1895 73 1898 1883 1896 79 1509 3536 73 1884 80 1512 2191 69 1897 1885 79 1502 1898 2514 74 1886 1899 79 2056 75 1596 1887 78 1260 1900 1939 72 1888 and the number of counties over which they were distributed, in each year from 1877 to 1900. The outbreaks are seen to have been more numerous in the decade of the ’nineties than in that of the ’eighties, though possibly this may have been due to greater official activity in the later period. The number of sheep attacked each year has ranged between 68,715 in 1877 and 18,762 in 1888. It is compulsory on owners to notify the authorities as to the existence of scab amongst their sheep, but there is no general or well-defined method of suppressing the disorder, and the periodical dipping of sheep for the destruction of the scab parasite is not obligatory. Each year the disorder runs a similar course, the outbreaks dwindling to a minimum in the summer months, June to August, and attaining a maximum in the winter months, December to February. It is chiefly in the “ flying ” flocks and not in the breeding flocks that the disease is rife, and it is so easily communicable that a drove of scab-infested sheep passing along a road may leave behind them traces sufficient to set up the disorder in a drove of healthy sheep that may follow. For its size and in relation to its sheep population, Wales harbours the disease to a far greater extent than the other divisions of Great Britain, as the following numbers of outbreaks in the three years 1898 to 1900 serve to show :—

The fatal disease known as anthrax did not form the subject of official returns previous to the passing of the Anthrax Order of 1886. Isolated outbreaks are of common occurrence, and from the totals for Great Britain given in Table XXIV. it would appear that there is little prospect of the eradication of this bacterial disorder. Glanders (including farcy) has been the subject, during the twenty-four years 1877 to 1900, of outbreaks in Great Britain ranging between a minimum of 518 in 1877 and a maximum of 1657 in 1892; in the former year 758 horses were attacked, and in the latter 3001. A recrudescence of the disease marked the closing years of the 19th century, the outbreaks having been 748 in 1898, 853 in 1899, and 1119 in 1900. The counties of Great Britain over which the annual outbreaks have been