We sure have come a long way in doctoring animals

I have heard of many strange and odd diseases concerning cattle, and some of them are actually real conditions that can and will kill a cow. Then there are those that are sorta made up because of unusual circumstances many years ago and passed down as folklore. I mean to tell you some of the stuff was dealt with in terrible ways and I am so thankful we have learned to take care of most in humane ways.

I mean humane ways like better prevention methods and surgeries that save lives of cows and calves. I like to know that a twisted gut on a cow can be remedied most of the time and a horse that has tried to commit hari kari by eating a sack of cake will never show it in his hooves. Founder is not the last word on a good horse anymore! Cattle die of many causes but few are killed by blackleg or leptospirosis, thanks to the scientific advances in the world of agriculture.

All in all, our business has advanced beyond the wildest imaginations of the generation before me. The eradication of Brucellosis has been a wonderful advancement for both the human and cattle industries. Well, there aren't many human industries, I guess, but you know what I mean. You can milk a cow and drink the milk without worry. If you can milk a cow, especially a beef cow, that in itself might bring up a worry or two, but I digress.

We had a neighbor when I was a sprout -- he lived south of us about 30 miles -- and my Pappy and he traded out work many times. He always helped with the spring work and we helped him do his. Both places were about the size of the state of Delaware and it was a big job to gather all the livestock, but we got it done. Pinkeye was bad one year and our neighbor threw salt in the infected eyes as a cure. It probably cured the animal from being driven back to that location ever again! And when something looked really bad, we just shot the animal and pulled the carcass off to Dead Cow Gully!

Pappy would be amazed that there is now a vaccine for pinkeye. He would be amazed about a multitude of veterinary practices today. He would sure like to have used some in his day and time but old Doc Leath was about the next best thing to a deer rifle. So, we all tried what he advised and he tried to do good; just didn't have the knowledge that is available today.

It is my opinion, and everyone has one. That feller that took a tall very thin steer with a split tail head to the sale last week was trying to doctor what was well known as Hollow Tail disease. It made the animal affected lose weight, cough, get worse by the day and finally die. The prevention method was to cut a long slit in the tail head toward the end and fill it with salt.

We now recognize the disease as starvation by living on a rock pile with no grass. Yes, we have come a long way!

Keep your mower ready, it will dry out soon!

Bill is the pen name of the Gravette-area author of this weekly column. Opinions expressed are those of the author.

Editorial on 07/15/2015