Braxy, or SICKNESS, is a name loosely used to indicate a disease in sheep; but in different parts of the country totally different disorders are included under this head. Of the two most generally recognised as braxy, the one is an intestinal affection attended with obstinate diarrhoea; the other is a blood disease, and the result of plethora or fullness of blood. The second, which is spoken of by the better informed shepherds as the true braxy, may best be described here, and is most usually seen in hoggs or sheep a year old. The disease is most prevalent during the months of October, November, and December, and occurs almost as an epidemic after a dry summer which is followed by an autumn aftergrowth. It also occurs among hoggs which have been removed from a poor pasture into turnips or rich succulent grass. The sudden alterations of diet cause irritation of the stomach and bowels, which is followed by the generation of gases, and acute inflammation of them, resulting in sudden death. It also occurs in hoggs which are in very high condition, and whose digestive systems have been so overworked that they cease acting; and as a consequence, gases are generated in the bowels and stomach, and inflammation following, death quickly ensues.
The majority of cases are found dead, but in the few which have been noticed during life, the following symptoms have been observed: loss of appetite, walking with an arched back, short steps, signs of pain, hurried breathing, swelling of the abdomen, then convulsions and death. Putrefaction sets in almost before death. After death the flesh appears of a dark-red colour, and the veins are charged with dark blood, but, on the whole, the body of the sheep looks so well that the mountain-shepherd cuts it up to make 'braxy mutton.' The bowels are found much inflamed and filled with gases, but there are no other special symptoms than the above to indicate the disease.
In the second form of braxy, chronic indigestion is induced by bad, unwholesome, non-nutritious foods, which cause constipation, dropsy of the dew-lap, limbs, and abdomen, and terminates in death from bloodlessness, or in other words, starvation.
The prevention of the disease alone affords hope, and it consists in regulating the animal's diet, to prevent sudden transitions from low to rich keep; to mix food so as to modify the action of the more highly nitrogenous kinds; and to check the development of plethora or fullness of blood by saline purgatives and diuretics, such as Epsom and Glauber salts or nitre.