THE MOSS ON THE TREES SHOWS IT IS LOUISIANA AND THE CATTLE SHOW THAT THE TICK HAS BEEN DIPPED OUT.

A TICK-FREE

SOUTH

U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE

BUREAU OF ANIMAL INDUSTRY
Washington, D. C,

A TICK-FREE DAIRY HERD IN SOUTH CAROLINA.

De 6£ :De
oct ‘22 1917

SS A TICK-FREE SOUTH.

HE cattle tick is being stamped out in the South.

On thousands of farms, where it once feasted
- on unthrifty scrubs, there are now pure-bred bulls
and grade herds of beef and dairy cattle, grazing in
security and turning their owners’ feed into flesh and
milk untaxed by the toll of blood the tick levies on
its victims. The change that the elimination of the
pest can bring is shown in these pictures. Their like
can be seen in any of the tick-freed areas. These areas
are growing in number and size each year. Already
many States are absolutely free, and the total eradica-
tion of the tick is now only a matter of determination on
the part of those who still suffer from it. A trifling in-
vestment of money and trouble will release any county
from the handicap under which southern farmers have
always labored.

Good live stock is the basis of good farming. Without
cattle pastures lie idle, roughage goes to waste, there is
no manure with which to enrich the soil, and the farmer
must depend for his living almost entirely upon one or
two cash crops, which may or may not yield him a profit.
With poor cattle the upshot is much the same, for scrubs
do not turn feed into beef and milk to the extent that

grade stock does. The average run of cattle in the South
90156 °—17

to-day unquestionably is far inferior to the stock in other
sections where natural conditions are less favorable, and,
in consequence, the returns to the southern farmer are

unduly small.

(9)

The tick is the explanation. For generations this para-
site has been sucking the blood of the cattle of the South,
killing some with Texas fever and weakening the vitality
of the survivors. But above all it has prevented the
introduction of new and better blood with which to build
up the run-down herds. There is a saying among cattle
men that the bull is half the herd, but few owners care to
import a valuable bull into a ticky country only to see it
die of tick fever. The returns from grade stock in
heavier, fatter animals and in greater milk production
have been demonstrated many times. Elsewhere the
farmer is taking the lesson to heart, but the man in a
ticky county is helpless to act upon it no matter how
convinced of its importance.

When the tick goes out it leaves the door open for the
pure-bred bull to come in. Like most good things, such
an animal costs money, but for those unable to make
such a heavy investment there are the cooperative bull
clubs. Through the medium of these organizations
farmers can secure for themselyes at a very moderate

cost all the benefits of a pure-bred sire which replaces
in a community a number of individually owned scrub
bulls. These scrubs may and in all probability do rep-
represent in the aggregate a much larger investment than
the one pure-bred, but they do nothing like as much
to bring money into the community. In one club the

On January 1, 1915, the average price of 2-year-old beef
cattle in 10 tick-infested States was $25.90. For the
remainder of the country it was $48.47. Eighteen tick-
free States had an average of over $50, and only two
were under $40. Part of this difference is due to the
fact that ticky cattle are not only scrubs but unhealthy

This sire started with good blood but ticks are getting the blood that ought to
go into breeding strength.

membership fee was $7.50 a year. In return the farmer
obtained in the course of a period of 10 years the sery-
ices of five $240 bulls.

The ultimate effect of such organization upon the
character of the herds is, of course, obvious. And the
South is badly in need of improvement in this respect.

(6)

This shows what ticks do to a pure-bred cow—suck out the valuable blood that
she should be giving to her calves. The better the blood, the more costly the
tick’s meal.

scrubs as well. The blood that should go to the making

of flesh is wasted in feeding the tick. The tick grows

fat, the steer stays thin. In one case in which a tick-
infested steer was dipped as an experiment in the arsen-
ical bath for a period of two months, the animal’s weight
on the same feed rose from 730 to 1,015 pounds. With

A TICKY HERD. MACHINES FOR TURNING PASTURAGE AND FEED INTO BLOOD FOR TICKS INSTEAD OF INTO MEAT, MILK, AND
PROFITS FOR THEIR OWNER.

(7)

dairy cattle there is a corresponding loss in the milk flow
from ticky stock. Depending on the heaviness of the
infestation this loss in milk may range from 18 to 42 per
cent of the normal production, and a reduction of even
18 per cent is quite sufficient to turn a dairyman’s profit
into a loss.

Under these conditions it is not surprising that in
many parts of the South to-day both dairying and beef
raising are neglected and unpopular industries. The
remedy is, however, simple. The way to get rid of the
tick is known as positively as the harm that it does.
Repeated dippings in an arsenical bath of all the herds
in a county will kill off the pest in the course of one
season, and thereafter all that is needed is a little care
to prevent its regaining a foothold. The danger of this
is, of course, diminishing fast as the tick is removed from
one stronghold after another. Already 312,012 square
miles have been cleaned and released from quarantine
out of a total infested area 10 years ago of 728,565 square
miles. There is no southern State in which some terri-
tory has not been reclaimed, and in all this work there
are only two instances of a county once freed allowing
itself to become reinfested.

The cost of dipping in comparison with the benefits
is trivial. From $40 to $60 should cover the cost of the
materials for a dipping vat for the neighborhood, and
the labor is usually donated by those who expect to use

the bath. The cost of the arsenic and other materials
used in preparing the bath is well under 5 cents a season
for each head of cattle dipped. Vats and baths must be
supplied by the people of the county, but the U. S.
Department of Agriculture will furnish trained men to
supervise the construction of the vats, the preparation
of the baths, and the actual dipping of the cattle. Under
such supervision there is no danger of injury to the
cattle. A few simple precautions do away with all risk
of this. The animals, for example, should not be thirsty
when dipped, as they might be tempted to drink in the
bath, and this is intended for external use only. For
10 years now, however, cattle have been dipped in
thousands in these vats and there is no evidence that
any appreciable number have ever been injured in any
way.

There is far more danger that indifference, negligence,
or sheer laziness on the part of a few cattle owners will
hold the work back or render it of no avail. To be
effective the dipping must be done at intervals of ap-
proximately two weeks and all cattle must be dipped.
To overlook a few steers is to leave to the tick a feeding
eround and a breeding refuge from which they will
emerge to raid anew the dipped cattle on other farms.
In every county there are usually a few recalcitrants
who either can not or will not see any good in tick eradi-
cation. Unless their neighbors are willing to suffer

.

Aaa to Posey

A swim through the arsenical dipping vat and the cattle
are freed from blood-sucking ticks. A few more treatments
and the county is tick free and ready to welcome the
prosperity that comes from good cattle and dairy herds.

(9)

indefinitely for their obstinacy these men must be com-
pelled to dip with the rest. For this reason the custom-
ary preliminary to a campaign of eradication is a county
election in which the people vote for or against the
undertaking. If eradication is carried, the local authori-
ties are empowered to enforce the necessary regulations.

Sanitary Board will designate the parishes in which work
is to be done, inaugurating in this way a systematic cam-
paign that will result in the freeing of the entire State.

A strong argument for this movement to make eradi-
cation a State instead of a county matter is to be
found in the injurious effect upon a free county of a tick-

This pure-bred bull was dipped at intervals of 14 days by his Georgia owner.
The owner knows his blood is worth more in calves than in ticks.

Two States, Mississippi and Louisiana, however, have
gone further than this. In the belief that the existence
of the tick in any county is a menace to the prosperity
of the entire State, the people of Mississippi have decreed
that all tick-infested counties shall undertake eradication.
In Louisiana, after April 1, 1918, the State Live Stock

(10)

The ticks were dipped out and she was brought

This cow couldn’t live with ticks.
in—made 160 pounds of butter in 80 days and her offspring sold for $1,000.

infested neighbor. The Federal Government, as is well
known, has quarantined all ticky sections. From these
areas no cattle can be shipped out unless they have been
dipped under Federal inspection or are intended for im-
mediate slaughter. Obviously these restrictions, essential
for the protection of the rest of the country, hamper the

marketing of local cattle and tend to depress the price of
steers in the quarantined areas. Unfortunately, this effect
extends, to some éxtent at least, to those counties which,
though free themselves and released from quarantine,
may chance to be surrounded by infested territory. It is
because so much of Mississippi already has been cleared
of the pest that the people of the State are in a position
to insist that a few backward counties shall not indefi-
nitely disturb the trade of the whole State.

For the tick and prosperity do not get on well together;
they are not good neighbors. The tick means poor,
scrubby, unthrifty cattle; prosperity demands good herds,
well cared for. The South, with its long growing season,
its abundance of cheap feeds, and its mild climate, can
raise cattle economically and market them profitably.
Where this is being done to-day the whole aspect of farm
life has been changed. It can be done everywhere, if only
the tick is eradicated. And the tick can be eradicated.

THE OWNER OF THIS TEXAS HERD FOUND IT PAID TO GET RID OF TICKS.

THIS MISSISSIPPI SCENE SHOWS THE TYPE OF FARM THAT FOLLOWS THE DIPPING VAT.
(12)

A GEORGIA DAIRY FARM TYPICAL OF WHAT MIGHT BE COMMON IN THE SOUTH BUT FOR THE TICKS.
(13)

THE OWNER OF THIS ARKANSAS FARM FIRST GOT RID OF THE TICK AND THEN GOT RID OF SCRUB CATTLE.
(14)

DAIRY PROSPERITY ON A TICK-FREE ALABAMA FARM.
(15)

LIBRARY OF CONGRES

@ 002 I ut Q@

For further information in regard to tick eradication you are requested to write to the Bureau of Animal Industry,
U.S. Department of Agriculture, Washington, D. C., or to the local office of the bureau in your State.
Address “‘Bureau of Animal Industry”’ at any of the following places:

Jefferson County Savings Bank Building, Birmingham, Ala.
Gazette Building, Little Rock, Ark.

Herd Building, Jacksonville, Fla.

Federal Building, Atlanta, Ga.

Roumain Building, Baton Rouge, La.

Millsaps Building, Jackson, Miss.

Federal Building, Washington, N.C.

Western Union Building, McAlester, Okla.

Union National Bank Building, Columbia, S. C.
Live Stock Exchange Building, Fort Worth, Tex.
Kress Building, Houston, Tex.

WASHINGTON : GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE : 1917

Hollinger Corp.
pH 8.5