Domestic fowl and ornamental poultry

Front matter

- -^^0^

DOMESTIC ro¥L /^>^2

ORNAMENTAL POULTRY;

Index

Accidents to fowl, how treated, 87 Age, great, of geese, 82.

Animal food, requisite in feeding poultry, 19 ; proper kinds, best mode of giving,

Ashes and Litter, in a poultry-house, 14.

Asthma, 90.

Aylesbury Duck, 86.

Bankiva Fowl, described, 26 ; originate the Bantam and Turkish fowl.

Bantam, the origin and varieties of, 25 ; description of, 61.

Barbary Fowl, 45.

Barndoor Fowl, 55.

Bolton Greys, 45.

Breeding Poultry, advantages attending, 7 ; profits accruing from, 8.

Buckwheat promotes fecundity in poultry, i

Cabin, Cottier's, advantage of poultry roosting there in winter, 16.

Call Duck, 87.

Canada Goose, 75.

Capons, fattening of, 96.

Caponising, 92 ; objects proposed in, ib.; process, ib.; treatment, ib.; performed on hens, 94 ; on pullets, ib.; precautions, ib.; sometimes performed on turkeys, geese, and ducks, 96.

Chick, formation of the embryo, 33.

Chickens, when hatched, how to tend before they leave the egg, 32 ; how they manage to break the shell, 34 ; when | they are to be assisted in liberating themselves, 35 ; nature of their first feeding, 35 ; of their housing, 35, 36.

Chinese Goose, 77.

Chittagong, the, 37.

Christmas, goose a favorite dish at, 74.

Cochin-China Fowl, the, 38.

Cock, Domestic, separate feeding requisite for, 17 ; partialities for particular hens, ib.; dislikes of and their causes, 18 ; common, description of, 21 ; his history, i 23 ; a sacred bird with the ancients, ib.; J importance attached to among ourselves

from earliest times, ib.; original country of untraceable. 23 ; various opinions of the original country of, ib.; reasons for deducing his pedigree from the Jago, Sumatra, and Java fowl, 25 ; selection of a good, 28 ; pugnacity of, how repressed, 29 ; apparent feelings of in crowing, ib.; his fondness of a clean and trim plumage, ib.; gigantic, or St.

Jago fowl, described, 26; the goldspan^led Polish, 42 ; silver-spangled Polish, ib.; white-crested black Polish, 43 ; Dutch everyday laver, 44 ; Dorking, 45 ; the Malay, 37 ; the Cochin-China, 33 ; the Spanish, 40 ; cock-fighting among the ancient Greeks and Romano, 22 ; its introduction into Britain, 22.

Columbian Fowl 42.

Consumption, 91.

Corns, 92.

Costiveness, 92.

Cramm.ing of fowl, practised by the ancient Romans, 22 ; cruel and unwholesome practice mth geese, 113.

Diarrhosa, 91.

Dietary, varied required for fowl, 20.

Diseases of fowl, 87.

Dorking Fowl, 46.

Dorking Hens good sitters, 37.

Duck, the species admit of a natural threefold division, 83 ; power to find their food, 84 ; value of domesticated, ib.; habits of the whole race, ib.; the domestic, ib.; feeding and fattening, 86 ; hatching, ib.

Dunghill Fowl, the, 55.

Dutch Everyday Layers, 44.

Dutch Fowl, the, 55.

East Indian Black Duck, 87.

Egg, shape of. indicates the gender of the future chick, 32.

Eggs, for hatching, how to preserve, 31 ; for hatching, how to select, 32 ; during the process of hatching, broken to

INDEX.

show the mode of furnishiug the nutriment, 33.

Every-day layers. 44.

Fattening of chickens, 21 ; of geese, 80 ; of ducks, 84 ; of turkeys, 66.

Feeding, separate, advisable for poultry in certain cases, 17 ; precarious in the farm-yard not to be depended on, 18 ; substances that may be used in, ib.; necessity of animal food in, 19 ; mode of giving it, ib.; peculiar, calculated to

f promote fecundity, how given, ib.;

varied, necessary, 20 ; stimulating, a favorite with fowl, ib.; fattening, 21.

Fever, 91.

Fowl, Domestic, housing for, 9 ; methods of feeding, 17 ; the origin of, 21 ; selection of stock of, 27 ; hatching of, 32 ; management of the young brood of, 35 ; varieties of, 3S.

Frizzled Fowl, the, 54.

Game Fowl, 48 ; management of breeding, 29, 49 ; varieties of, 50.

Goose, the, 73 ; common wild or gray-lag, 74 ; fattening of, 82 ; the white-fronted, 74; the Canada, 75; the domestic, ib.; the Toulouse, ib.; the Chinese, 77 ; varieties of the domestic, 78 ; breeding the, 81 ; food of the young, 80 ; keeping, ib.; fattening, 81 ; French process of fattening, 82 ; Polish process, ib.; plucking alive for the feathers, 83.

Gout, 92.

Grass-plot, requisite in poultry-house, 14.

Grey-lag Goose, 74.

Guinea Hen, tlie, 68; its origin, ib.; its characteristics, 69. '

Hamburgh Fowl. 44.

Hatcliing, best situation for, 10 ; the nest for must be clean, 11 ; how conducted where there is more than one breed of fowl, ib.; choice of a good domestic hen for, 30 ; marks of a hen's anxiety for, ib.; liow to induce tiie desire lor, ib.; inconstancy of a hen in, how remedied, ib.; over-constancy, how treated, 31 ; breaking the eggs in, how reme died, ib.

Hemp-seed recommended for increasing fecundity in poultry, 19.

Hen, Domestic, described, 21 ; the number of hens to be allotted to one cock, 27 ; selection of a good cock, 28 ; choice of a good one for "incubation, 30 ; the Malay, a valuable cross-breed, 37 ; the Cochin-China, 38 ; the Spanish, 41 ; the gold-spangled Polish, 42 ; white-crested I black Polish, 43 ; Dutch every-day layer, 44 ; Dorking, 47.

Hen-coop, description of a, 16, 17.

Incubation, period of, in the various domestic few], 36.

Indigestion, 91.

Inflammation, 89 ; of the lungs, 90 ; of the heart, ib.

Java Fowl, 37.

Jumper, the, 53.

Jungle Fowl, description of, 23.

Litter, how pleasing to poultry, 14.

Malay Fowl, 37 ; a cross from them deserving the breeder's attention, 38. aioulting, 87.

Muscovy Duck, 86.

Negro Fowl, 55.

Nests for poultry, how made and disposed,

10 ; those that are most easily cleaned,

Parasites in fowls, 91.

Peacock, the, 60.

Pepper, a favorite relish with domestic fowl, 20.

Perch for poultry, the best, 9.

Pheasant Fowl, 51.

Pheasant, Malay, ib.

Pintado, the, 68.

Polish Fowl, 42 ; the spangled, 43 ; the white-crested black, ib.; the white, 44.

Pouch, abdominal, of the Toulouse goose, 76.

Poultry, separate feeding of, in certain cases, 17 ; their dispositions to be observed, 29.

Poultry houses, 9 ; how to be well kept, 10 ; how to be warmed, ib.; cleanliness and space for exercise essential to, 12 ; separate cribs for the diseased requisite in, ib.; separate pens requisite in, 13; grouud-plan for, ib.; the house itself described, 12 ; various requisites for, 14, 15.

Prices of superior poultry, 8.

Profit, of rearing turkeys, 65.

Pugnacity in the cock, how repressed, 29.

Pulse, sorts unwholesome to turkeys, 67.

Rouen Duck, 86.

Rumpkin, the, -53.

Russian Fowl, 54.

Sand, for a i)Oultry house, 14, 20.

Shaketag, the, 38 ; his origin, ib.

SiberianFowl, the, 64.

Silky Fowl, the, 53.

Sitting, inconstancy in, how remedied, 30 ; overconstancy in, how treated in a hen, 31 ; how to preserve eggs for, ib.; to select eggs for, 32 ; management of the eggs during the, ib.; when and how to aid, 34 ; table giving time of sitting and the number of eggs hatchable by the various domestic fowl, 36.

VI

Spangled Fowl, their varieties, 44 ; confusion in distinguishing them, ib.

Spanish Fowl, 41.

Sussex Fowl, 47.

Swan, the, 70 ; the mute, 71 ; the domestic, ib.; the black, 73.

the domestic, 61 ; varieties of, 62 ; best mode of keeping, ib.; treatment of the chickens, 64 ; feeding, ib.; fattening, 66 ; the weight of, 67.

Turkish Fowl, the, 63.

j Vermin, approved method of ridding ! poultry of, 14.

Toulouse Goose, 76.

Turkey, the, 66 ; mistake of Linnaeus in

his name for, ib.j original country of, ! Web-footed Fowl, 70. ib.; his introduction into England, 57 ; origin of his English name, ib.; the wild, 58 ; his movements, 59 ; experiments in crossing with the domestic, 60 ;

Yard, an outer and inner, to be attached to a poultry-house, 13.

DOMESTIC FOWL.

" How grateful 'tis to wake While raves the midnight storm, and hear the sound Of busy grinders at the well-filled rack ; Or flapping wing or crow of chanticleer, Long ere the lingering morn ; or bouncing flails That tell the dawn is near ! Pleasant the path By sunny garden wall, when all the fields Are chill and comfortless ; or barn-yard snug, Where flocking birds, of various plume and chirp Discordant, cluster on the leaning stack From whence the thresher draws the rustling sheaves

Chapter I. View Of The Impoetance Of The Subject

Poultry keeping is an amusement in which every body may indulge. The space needed is not great, the cost of food for a few head, insignificant, and the luxury of fresh eggs or home-fatted chickens and ducks not to be despised In a large collection of poultry may be read the geography and pro<-ress of the commerce of the world. The Peacock represents India ; the Golden Pheasant and a tribe of Ducks, China; the Turkey, pride of the yard and the table, America ; the Black Swan, rival of the snowy monarch of the lakes, reminds us of Australian discoveries; while Canada and Egypt have each their Goose. The large fat white Ducks-models of what a duck should be-are English, while the shining green black ones come from Buenos Ayres. And when we turn to the fowl varieties, Spain and Hamburgh, Poland and Cochin China, Friesland and Bantam, Java and Negroland, beside Surrey, Sussex, Kent, Suffolk, and Lancashire, have each a cock to crow for them.

But we may derive other useful lessons besides those of geography and commerce from the poultry yard. The same principles, the same close attention to food, warmth, and symmetry of form, which have produced perfection in short-horned cattle, Leicester sheep, and thorough-bred horses.

have, in a minor degree, afforded us Bantams, " true to a feather," as well as size and beauty in Spanish, Dorking, and Poland Fowl.

Whether poultry keeping can be rendered profitable, is a question which depends on a variety of circumstances, which cannot be alike in two localities ; because they depend on the cost of food, and the nett price which can be obtained for the produce in eggs or birds ; thus, one person with the free run of a fine dry upland warm common, with a ready market near, may make an excellent profit ; while another, bestowing equal care, but confined to a small field of cold soil, may lose nine out of ten of the most valuable young poultry.

Poultry may be converted into money either while living or when dead ; or they may be bred, partly for the market, and partly with a view to the disposal of their eggs.

First, as to the profit arising from the disposal of superfluous stock. This depends, of course, in a great measure, upon the quality and character of the birds kept, and hence the breeder should confine his fancy to the more valuable varieties. The expense of feeding and rearing a valuable fowl will not be found to exceed that required for a comparatively worthless one ; at least, if at all, only as regards comfort and warmth, which, if properly procured, are not very costly. Poultry of very superior quality and fashionable varieties, especially such as have obtained prizes at any of the first-rate agricultural exhibitions, will fetch a high price. Prize fowl, of extraordinary excellence, bring double price frequently ; but of course this is a price given for the brced^ and not for killing. In all these cases the producer must, of course, allow a fair profit to the dealer ; he cannot, therefore, reckon on more than two-thirds of the price, yet this will amply remunerate him.

But although there may be doubts about the profits, there can be none about the amusement to be derived from a well chosen collection of domestic birds, and, whether for profit or amusement, the rules to insure success are the same. It will be my endeavor to lay these down as plainly as possible.

Certainly the present, if any, is the time for making a profit by poultry, since all the inferior kinds of grain are cheap and likely to be cheaper. The demand for poultry increases rather than diminishes, and railroads have opened up cheap conveyances to market. The fact is that the great drawback on poultry rearing arises from loss by disease ; while the greatest profits are derived from successfully rearing the birds which are most subject to disease at inclement periods of the year.

Ducks and geese are more easily raised than fowl, turkeys, or guineafowl, if there be conveniences of grass and water; but then fine turkeys and fat young guinea-fo'wl in due season are sure of a sale at a good price. With respect to the poultry of farm houses, which are fed on what would other-

POULTRY HOUSES.

wise be wasted or what is collected by the industry of children ; — warmly housed, they often thrive better and prove more prolific than the expensively tended inmates of ornamental poultry houses.

In the following pages the most esteemed varieties of poultry and waterfowl will be described. The poultry keeper will find it to his advantage to keep a good breed in preference to a bad one. Some of the more beautiful or valuable kinds of poultry are too delicate to prove profitable ; but size, early maturity, and prolific hens, will, under the most unfavorable circumstances, be of more advantage than small, ugly, rarely-laying birds.

Chapter II. Poultry Houses

Before purchasing your poultry have your house all ready to receive them, or you may do your stock more harm in a few days, by close cooping or cold roosting them, than you can repair in a year. I design showing here how very readily, and at how small a cost, a sufliciently good, and in every respect suitable poultry-house may be erected. I cannot, of course, desire to recommend any restrictions to those whom Providence has favored with wealth. There exists no reasonable objection to such as can afford it gratifying their taste, either as to extent of accommodation or elegance of structure. The poor man, on the other hand, need not lay out one penny, and still may be as successful in his operations as his more wealthy neighbor. It is my object to write for all classes. I shall, accordingly, describe several sorts of poultry-houses, from that on the most perfect and extended scale, to that which can only boast of barely answering the purposes for which it is designed.

In nine cases out of ten some outhouse is appropriated to the purpose, without preparation or alteration. But, if consistent with your means, by all means build a proper house. Choose a piece of gravelly soil well drained on a slight declivity, near trees which will afford shade and shelter from winds. The building should be lofty enough to admit the poultry keeper without stooping, because, if it be inconvenient to enter, the chances are that regular cleaning will be neglected. Let the roof be kept weather tight. If slates or tiles are employed, the house should be ceiled in order to protect the fowls from draughts and rapid variations of temperature ; in default of lath and plaster a piece of asphelted felt closely nailed makes a cheap and efficient ceiling.

The best perch is made in the shape of a broad double ladder, stretched out so as to form a wide angle ; the bars being placed so far apart that one 1* fowl shall not overhang another. If roosting bars be used across the fowl-house, care should be taken that a convenient hen-ladder is always attached to them, and that they are not placed too high. Heavy fowl are apt to break their breast bones in trying to fly down from high perches.

The careful poultry keeper should take a vievi^ of the fowl at night after they have gone to roost, and see that they are all comfortable, not too crowded, with room enough for the weak ones to get away from the strong, who are apt to tyrannize. The floor must be dry, and covered with fine gravel or sand, and it should be swept clean every day. Nothing injures the health of fowl more than bad smells. To obviate this always keep a basket of slacked lime or old mortar in a corner with a shovel, so thai you may shake some over any dirt. The sweepings, if kept quite dry, form most valuable manure. For the same reason have the interior walls frequently whitewashed, and the window open in fine weather. If the window can be filled with a Venetian blind so much the better. The door should have a hole at the bottom with a sliding panel to admit the poultry during the day — by keeping it locked you have a better chance of gathering plenty of eggs. If you have no windows, movable loose boards fitted to the door may be useful to admit air.

As warmth is so requisite to poultry, it will be an advantage if one side of the poultry house be against the outside wall of a kitchen or boiler-house, or a hot water pipe running through it from the hot-house will well repay the outlay. With a sweet clean warm poultry house you will have plenty of eggs long before more careless neighbors.

As to the nests, the great point is that they should be near to the ground, easily cleaned, and not too large. If they are too large two fowls will often try to sit in the same nest at the same time. If there is any difliculty in getting into them, hens are apt to drop their eggs on the ground. Nests may be made of wood, or basket-work ; there should be a small ledge to prevent the eggs from rolling out. A little old mortar or wood ashes laid at the bottom will tend to keep the nests clean. Straw and hay both make good lining for nests.

If the nests are arranged in two stories there should be a broad ledge wide enough for a hen to walk on in front of the top row, like the platform of a drawing-room verandah, and a hen-ladder should be placed at each end, but nests are better on the ground.

It is very advantageous to place fowl which are sitting in a retired situation where they will not be annoyed by other fowl, and where, when the hatching takes place, they can be cooped with their young out of danger, with a dry yard or close cropped lawn in front to run on. Many hens, as well as peafowl and turkeys, are vicious, and will try to destroy a rival brood.

A small box, about a yard square, with a hard dry floor, and a movable

POULTRY HOUSES.

wooden top, is excellent as a sitting-room for hens. I have seen an old cucumber frame covered with wooden slabs successfully arranged for bringing up early broods.

Be sure before you put a fowl to set that the nest is perfectly clean ; if the hen becomes infested with vermin she pines and cannot set close.

It will often be found cheaper to make a good fowl-house at first, than to be continually adding and patching.

Of course if you have more than one breed of fowl, they must be kept separate, if you intend to keep the race pure. Where this is attempted, an enclosure adjoining the poultry-house, with three divisions of iron wire, will be found useful, if the space and cost can be spared. In these enclosures in wet cold weather, the poultry can be confined, with room to scratch and feed. The largest division will be for your laying hens and turkeys, and miscellaneous stock. In this space you can muster them, accustom them to be fed, and see that all are in health, and make the close observations which are needful for success. In the second you can place hens with young broods before they are strong enough to mix with the other fowl. In the third, and smallest, poultry for fatting. If just large enough for them to enjoy the air

POULTRY HOUSE.

DOMESTIC FOWL.

TRANSVERSE SECTION.

L, the la3-ing apartment ; H, hatching-room . n, nest boxes ; b, b, boxes and troughs for water feed, sand, &c.; d, an opening, or door, for entrance and going out ; a, latticed window, for ventilation ; jR, roosting-place, separated from apartments below by the ceilings c, c ; h, ventilating hole ; I", ventilator on roof ; p, roosting pole ; t, trough for dung.

without being able to run about much, with shade, sun, plenty of clean water, and food, they will generally thrive better than when cooped. A few good coops, eitherof wood and wire, or wicker, with the top thatched, should always be at hand. These should be made so as to shut up the chickens if necessary, as well as the hens. If the fowl-house is large enough have a small sink in one corner where it is light, and if it is not large enough, put in the yard, under shade, a large glazed earthenware pan, and fill it with fine sand, or ashes, or slacked lime, or burned oyster shells, as a dust bath for the fowl. By placing the stuff in a pan it is easily changed from time to time.

If you are obliged to put up with a small lean-to or other confined place, for your fowl-house, at any rate take care to keep it clean, for warmth, cleanliness, and judicious feeding are the cardinal maxims for poultry management.

Nothing more is necessary for the keeping poultry with profit and advantage, beyond having a small shed or light building, formed in some warm, sunny, and at the same time, sheltered situation, fitted up with proper divisions, boxes, lockers, or other contrivances for the dwelling of the different sorts of birds, and places for their laying in. This and cleanliness suffice.

" Cleanliness," says Mr. Beatson, " with as free a circulation as possible, and a proper space for the poultry to run in, is essential to the rearing of this sort of stock with the greatest advantage and success, as in narrow and confined situations they are never found to answer well."

In every establishment for poultry rearing there ought to be some separate crib or cribs, into which to remove fowl when laboring under disease ; for not only are many of the diseases to which poultry are liable highly contagious, but the sick birds are also regarded with dislike by such as are in

POULTRY HOUSES.

health ; and the latter will generally attack and maltreat them, thus at the very least aggravating the sufferings of the afflicted fowl, even if they do not actually deprive them of life. The moment, therefore, that a bird is perceived to droop or appear to be pining, it should be removed to one of these infirmaries.

Separate pens are also necessary to avoid quarreling among some of the highly-blooded breeds, more particularly the game fowl. They are also necessary when different varieties are kept, in order to avoid improper or undesired commixture from accidental crossing. These lodgings may be most readily constructed in rows, parallel to each other; the partitions may be formed of lattice work — they will be rather ornamental than otherv/ise, and the cost of their erection will be but trifling. Each of these lodgings should be divided into two compartments, one somewhat larger than the other. One compartment is to be close and warm for the sleeping-room ; the other, and the larger one, should be airy and open, that the birds may enjoy themselves in the day-time ; both should be kept particularly dry and clean, and be well protected from the weather.

jar nnnnnjiinnnni jjijimi.

— \]~'\ 1 nnnn^unuinBHi^

X

GROUND PLAN.

X, laying-room ; H, hatching-room ; n, n, nests for laying ; o, o, nests for hatching ; I, ladder ; s, stove.

Attached to the house should be a well -drained yard, with a division of wire or trellis work for every ward, with water in each; and it will be advantageous to have outside of this yard a wider range of turf and gravel, where the fowl can be more at large. When different broods are kept, and it is desired to keep them apart, the larger yard must be shared in turn by the inhabitants of the different wards. The hatching- ward and the feedingward should be kept separate. A roosting and hatching- ward for ducks and

DOMESTIC FOWL.

geese, with a small pond, accessible to all the inhabitants of the poultry - yard, should be added.

WATER DISH A^D TANK.

Every poultry-house should be provided with a sufficient quantity of small sand ; or, if such cannot be procured, clean ashes are a good substitute ; pieces of chalk are also a useful, nay, necessary adjunct ; crude lime acts, however, as a poison. Some horse-dung or chaff, with a little corn through it, is also a source of much amusement to the birds ; and it should be borne in mind that amusement^ even in the poultry-yard, is materially conducive to health. The ashes and litter should be frequently changed, and had better also be kept in little trenches^ in order that they may not be scattered about, giving a dirty or untidy appearance to the yard. When, however, your fowl have a run in a garden or field, of average extent, this artificial care will be replaced by nature.

If the court be not supplied with a little grass-plot, a few squares of fresh grass sods should be placed in it, and changed every three or four days. If the court be too open, some bushes or shrubs will be found useful in affording shelter from the too perpendicular beams of the noon-day sun, and probably in occasionally screening the chicken from the rapacious glance of the kite or raven. If access to the sleeping-room be, as it ought, denied during the day, the fowl should have some shed or other covering, beneath which they can run in case of rain : this is w^hat is termed " a storm hmsc ;^^ and, lastly, there should be a constant supply of pure^ fresh ivater.

Fowl frequently suffer much annoyance from the presence of vermin, and a hen will often quit her nest, when sitting, in order to get rid of them. This is one of the uses of the sand or dust bath ; but a better remedy, and rOULTEY HOUSES.

RUSTIC POULTRY-HOUSE.

one of far speedier and more certain efficacy, is to have the laying nests composed of dry heather and small branches of hawthorn, covered over with white lichen. These materials, rubbed together by the pressure and motion of the hen, emit a large powder, which, making its vv'ay between the feathers to the skin, is found to have the effect of dislodging every sort of troublesome parasite.

The fowl-house should also be frequently and thoroughly cleaned out, and it is better that the nests be npt fixtures, but formed in little flat, wicker baskets, like sieves, which can be frequently taken down, the soiled strav/

FEEDING-BOX.

DOMESTIC FOWL.

thrown out, and themselves thoroughly washed : or formed of wooden boxes, with a sliding bottom. In either case, hay is objectionable, as tending to the production of these vermin. Fumigation, at no very remote intervals, is also highly to be commended. Nothing is of more importance to the well-being of your poultry than a good, airy walk. These maxims cannot be too often impressed on the poultry keeper.

A COTTAGE POULTRY-HOUSE.

As good a mode of rearing fowl as can be adopted is the old custom of suffering them to roost on the rafters of the room in which the cottier keeps his fire ; and it is, perhaps, owing to the warmth thus afforded to the birds, that, during winter, when eggs are scarce, and consequently at a high price, they will be procurable from the humble cabin, when they have long vanished from the elaborately constructed, but less warm poultry-house of the more affluent fancier.

Should circumstances, however, render the keeping poultry in the cabin objectionable or unadvisable, a very sufficient place may be erected for them against the outside of the cabin wall ; and, if possible, the part of the wall against which the little hut is erected should be that opposite to the fireplace within — thus securing the necessary warmth. If shelter be required, it can be obtained by means of a few bushes, or a wall of sods ; the neighboring roads will serve as an ample walk ; the nearest stream will slake their thirst. A few laying-nests may be placed in a warm corner of the cabin, and the poultry of the poor cottier will thrive as well, and yield as great a profit, as those kept in the best appointed establishments.

COOP AND FEEDING-BOX.

By confining a hen some hours in the day to the coop, she is prevented from rambling into danger, and yet has the liberty of enjoying fresh air.

HOW TO FEED POULTRY.

and the pleasure of seeing her chicks run in and out through the bars, returning to her when her voice warns them to seek shelter with her in the friendly coop, on the approach of a shower or of any other danger. The instincts of the young birds will generally lead them to obey her voice, even though it be that of a step-mother.

TENT-SHAPED COOPS.

Chapter III. How To Feed Poultry

Do NOT feed your hens too highly before they begin to lay, or while laying, or immediately after ceasing to lay, unless you wish to fatten them for table use ; for as soon as a fowl begins to fatten she stops laying. You must, therefore, separate the two classes of fowl, layers and fatteners, at all events at feeding time. Make some separate provision for your cocks ; if they are only fed in company with the hens, they are apt to think too much of their mistresses and to neglect their own appetites ; and recollect that to have strong chickens, you must have strong cocks, which an ill-fed bird cannot be expected to prove.