Kuchemeister, Siebold, and others have bred the Taenia caenurus in the dog, by giving the Caenurus cerebralis of the sheep. The latter worm is well known as the hydatid worm which is so often met with in the brain of sheep, and which produces the disease known as "sturdy." The mature worm exactly corresponds with the Taenia solium of man. On the other hand, when the ripe joints of this taenia were given to young lambs with their food, symptoms of sturdy came on in about eighteen days afterwards. On examining the bodies, the Cysticercus caenurus cerebralis was found in different organs in progressive stages of formation, but it was only in the brain where the true cystic form was found developed. Hence the brains of sturdy sheep should not be given to a dog as food; and no dog affected with taenia should be kept near a flock, until it is quite free from the worm. Stall-fed flocks, no dog being required, are free from sturdy.

The ova of the canine taenia may get into the human body, either by means of eating vegetables, or other food, or by drinking water where dogs are allowed to run about, or by allowing the dog to kiss its mistress's lips. In Iceland fearful effects follow. There hundreds of dogs are kept to tend the sheep and cattle. They get their taeniae by eating the offal - so often containing larval worms - of the slaughtered cattle. The eggs of these taenia, when in the human body, produce the Cysti-cercus echinococcus, from which it is said one-sixth of the whole population suffers. Should this cystic worm, which contains innumerable taenia heads, be discharged from the man's bowels or stomach, or make their way out by ulceration or by a surgical operation, the heads may be swallowed by dogs; and thus the stock of taenia is kept up, aided by the dog eating other cystic worms from the domestic animals.

(g) Siebold found another kind of cestoid worm, corresponding with the human bothriocephalic, voided in fragments by a Pomeranian dog. It is the Dibothrius serratum.

General Symptoms

The animal affected with worms in the bowels is usually dull and depressed, uneasy and restless, utters doleful cries and howls, and becomes unsociable in disposition and irritable in temper. The hair is dry, shaggy, foul, and destitute of the natural gloss; appetite variable, and often ravenous; the breath offensive; and the nose dry and hot. Notwithstanding the greedy appetite, emaciation and weakness come on. Attacks of diarrhoea occasionally alternate with constipation; small lumps of mucus are voided, and little bits of excrement. Paroxysms of colic are frequent; fits attack young dogs especially. A tense and enlarged state of the belly, and a short, dry, irritable cough, are also occasionally symptomatic of worms. The "maw-worm" induces intolerable itching of the rectum, but rarely any of the more serious symptoms as above. Chobart records having seen many dogs vomit balls of Ascarides (Strongylus trigoncephalus?). These dogs had vertigo, convulsions, and coma, etc. The "round worm" sometimes crawls into the stomach, and even upwards into the nostrils, and then sets up great irritation. The severe symptoms are produced only by the taeniae, or when the other worms are present in large numbers. The taeniae sometimes obstruct the bowels, and thereby excite inflammation, followed by death. When the worm, or a piece of it, is discharged, the nature of the case is divested of its previous obscurity.

Treatment

The object is to destroy and expel the worms. The means are various: -

1. Areca Nut

Valuable against the round and maw worm. A dose - about two grains to every pound of the dog's weight - of the fresh powder should be given in broth thickened with oatmeal, every week for three or four weeks; and a dose of castor oil six hours after each dose of the nut.

2. Oil Of Turpentine

Alone it is apt to irritate and inflame the kidney, and intoxicate the brain. This is prevented by mixing with castor oil, which keeps it in the bowels and carries it off, although even then vomiting is sometimes excited. The dose is one drachm for a medium-sized dog, mixed with a tablespoonful of castor oil. It acts best against tape-worms.

3. Pomegranate Bark

About a scruple of the powdered bark, followed in six hours by a dose of castor oil, is a good anthelmintic against tape and round worms.

4. Powdered Glass

Powdered Glass, as much as covers a shilling, given in butter, is a popular and efficacious remedy.

5. Oil Of Male Fern

Oil Of Male Fern (twenty drops, made into a bolus with flour, and followed by a dose of castor oil) is valuable for tape-worm.

All of these remedies act differently in different dogs, so that whilst one dose may suffice in some cases, two or more may be necessary in others. The dose may also require to be increased, the effects on the animal being carefully watched, as the object is not to destroy the dog, but the parasite.

The dog should be starved for some hours before, and be strictly confined after, taking the medicine until the worms are discharged. They should then, with the discharged faeces, be burned or deeply buried. This mode of preventing propagation by the destruction of the ova is doubly imperative in the case of tape-worms.

An injection of olive oil is of service in ejecting the maw-worm from the rectum.