ABORTION.
This accident is by no means of so common occurrence in the sow as in many of our other domesticated animals. There are various causes which will tend to produce it; insufficiency of food, eating too much succulent vegetable food, or unwholesome unsubstantial diet; blows and falls will also induce it; and one very prevalent cause arises from this animal's habit of rubbing itself against hard bodies in order to allay the irritation produced by the vermin or cutaneous eruptions to which swine are subject.
Reiterated copulation does not appear to produce abortion in the sow, at least to the extent it does in other animals.
The symptoms indicative of approaching abortion are similar to those of parturition, only more intense. There is generally restlessness, irritation, and shiverings: and the cries of the animal testify the presence of severe labor-pains. Sometimes the rectum, vagina, or uterus becomes relaxed, and one or the other protrudes, and often becomes inverted at the moment of the expulsion of the fœtus, preceded by the placenta, which presents itself foremost.
Nothing can be done to prevent abortion at the last hour; all that we can do is, from the first to remove every predisposing cause. The treatment will depend upon circumstances. Where the animal is young, vigorous, and in high condition, bleeding will be beneficial, not a copious blood-letting, but small quantities taken at different times; purgatives may also be administered. If, when abortion has taken place, the whole of the litter are not born, emollient injections may be resorted to with considerable benefit; otherwise the after treatment should be much the same as in parturition, and the animal should be kept warm, and quiet, and clean, and allowed a certain degree of liberty.
Whenever one sow has aborted, the breeder should immediately look about for the causes likely to have induced this accident, and endeavor, by removing them, to secure the rest of the inhabitants of his piggery from a similar fate.
In cases of abortion, the fœtus is seldom born alive, and often has been dead for some days; where this is the case—and whether it is so or not will be easily detected by a peculiarly unpleasant putrid exhalation, and the discharge of a fetid liquid from the vagina—the parts should be washed with a diluted solution of chloride of lime, in the proportions of one part chloride to three parts water, and a portion of this lotion may be gently injected into the uterus if the animal will submit to the doing so. Mild doses of Epsom salts, tincture of gentian, and ginger will also act beneficially in such cases, and with attention to diet, soon restore the animal.
