Page 106 - Our Vanishing Wild Life

84 OUR VANISHING WILD LIFE
omycosis, or lumpy-jaw. It has been brought into the Zoological Park five times, by specimens shipped from Colorado, Texas, Wyoming and Montana. I think our first cases came to us in 1902.
In its early stage this disease is so subtle and slow that it is months in developing; and this feature renders it all the more deadly, through the spread of infection long before the ailment can be discovered.
One of our antelope arrivals, apparently in perfect health when received, was on general principles kept isolated in rigid quarantine for two months. At the expiration of that period, no disease of any kind having become manifest, the animal was placed on exhibition, with two others that had been in the Park for more than a year, in perfect health.
In one more week the late arrival developed a swelling on its jaw, drooled at the corner of the mouth, and became feverish,—sure symptoms ofthedreaddisease. Atonceitwasremovedandisolated,butinabout lo days it died. The other two antelopes were promptly attacked, and eventually died.
The course of the disease is very intense, and thus far it has proven incurableinourwildanimals. Wehavelostabout10antelopesfrom it, and one deer, usually, in each case, within ten days or two weeks from the discovery of the first outward sign,—the well known swelling onthejaw. Onecasethatwasdetectedimmediatelyuponarrivalwas very persistently treated by Dr. Blair, and the animal actually survived for four months, but finally it succumbed. From first to last not a single case was cured.
In 1912, the future of the prong-horned antelope in real captivity seems hopeless. We have decided not to bring any more specimens to our institution, partly because all available candidates seem reasonably certain to be afifected with lumpy-jaw, and partly because we are un- willing to run further risks of having other hoofed animals inoculated bythem. Todayweareanxiouslywonderingwhetherthejawdisease of the prong-horn is destined to exterminate the species. Such a catas- tropheismuchtobefeared. Thisisprobablyoneo^thereasonswhythe antelope is steadly disappearing, despite protection.
In 1906 we discovered the existence of actinomycosis among the black mountain sheep of northern British Columbia. Two specimens out of six were badly affected, the bones of the jaws being greatly enlarged, and perforated by deep pits. The black sheep of the Stickine and Is- koot regions are so seldom seen by white men, save when a sportsman kills his allotment of three specimens, we really do not know anything about the extent to which actinomycosis prevails in those herds, or how deadly are its effects. One thing seems quite certain, from the appear- ance of the diseased skulls found by the writer in the taxidermic labora- tory of Frederick Sauter, in New York. The enormous swelling of the diseased jaw bones clearly indicates a disease that in some cases affects itsvictimthroughoutmanymonths. Suchaconditionaswefoundin those sheep could not have been reached in a few days after the disease