Parasites External
FLEAS.
Washing with Spratts' medicated soap. Extra clean kennels. Dusting
with Keating, and afterwards washing. This may not kill the fleas, but
it drives them off.
Take the dog on the grass while dusting, and begin along the spine.
Never do it in the house.
TICKS.
I have noticed these disagreeable bloodsuckers only on the heads and
bodies of sporting or Collie dogs, who had been boring for some time
through coverts and thickets.
They soon make themselves visible, as the body swells up with the
blood they suck until they resemble small soft warts about as big as a pea.
They belong to the natural family, _Ixodiadae_.
_Treatment_--If not very numerous they should be cut off, and the part
touched with a little turps. The sulphuret of calcium will also kill
them, so will the more dangerous white precipitate, or even a strong
solution of carbolic acid, which must be used sparingly, however.
LICE.
The lice are hatched from nits, which we find clinging in rows, and
very tenaciously too, to the hairs. The insects themselves are more
difficult to find, but they are on puppies sometimes in thousands.
To destroy them I have tried several plans. Oil is very effectual, and
has safety to recommend it.
Common sweet oil is as good a cure as any, and you may add a little
oil of anise and some sublimed sulphur, which will increase the effect.
Quassia water may be used to damp the coat.
The matted portions of a long-haired dog's coat must be cut off with
scissors, for there the lice often lurk.
The oil dressing will not kill the nits, so that vinegar must be used.
After a few days the dressing must be repeated, and so on three or four times.
To do any good, the whole of the dog's coat must be drenched in oil, and the dog
washed with good dog soap and warm water twelve hours afterwards.
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