POULTRY KEEPING.

Auckland Star, Volume LXV, Issue 4, 5 January 1934, Page 12

POULTRY KEEPING.

SUMMER FEEDING HINTS.

EGGS IN THE DRY SEASON.

(By ORPINGTON.)

i It is very necessary, in the feeding of poultry, to strike, a happy medium between allowing them to get over-fat which happens so often when only a few birds are kept, and keeping thein short of the materials they require for eggmanufacture. These are supplied, during the late spring and early summer, by Nature, if hens or ducks have unlimited free range over good pasture, and at that time of the year the minimum of food need be supplied, just to keep the , birds in the habit of using their nests and house for sleeping in. It can be very troublesome if they become too wild, with hens roosting in trees and laying away. Of course, ducks must be brought home each night, or their eggs are lost. The completeness of food found on free range depends largely on the state of the pasture, just as it does with any other stock feeding, but also largely on the weather or dampness of the range, since poultry depend also on small life — worms, slugs, snails, and insects —which cease to be available as soon as dry weather sets in. If the land they are on is poor—and that is the land for poultry, since they will vastly improve it—the birds must be fed a little better all the time, for the farmer can only get from thein in eggs or meat what they can procure to eat. Even where the free range is rich in feed, there is a period from this time of year onwards when it pays the farmer, and pays him well, to feed some protein to his birds. If this is not done, eggs will slack ofl with the hot dry weather, the poorer birds will moult early, and hang on without laying through the autumn, and the best of them will lay, but get so out of condition that they will take the moult badly when they come to it, and go about in the cold weather half-naked. Pullets Should Lay Soon. Dry curd fills the requirements in the way of protein if sufficient is available, but with the prices fcr pigs as good as they are at present, many farmers have no skim milk to spare for the poultry. Meat meal, blood meal, and meat-and-bone meal are all cheap, as poultry foods go, in this country, and are good value for the results obtained. Five per cent is sufficient where free range is good, but confined birds or those on stale runs need 10 per cent in their mash. As long as the young stock was well hatched in good time —that is, before the first week in October —the pullets arc better without any, or with very little, protein in their feeding. This has been a good growing season for them, so that many will be reddening for laying, or even already in lay, if they were really early hatched. When once they are producing, they need the same laying ration as the hens, of course; but until then, keep them on bulky rations, with absolutely no forcing meals. Latchatchcd birds, on the other hand, arc not nearly so readily forced to lay before their bodies are full-grown, and can be given a more feeding diet. Indeed, a laying ration will not harm pullets that are no more than eight or ten weeks old now. Catching the Best Market. The ideal is to have pullets como into lay when they are from five and a half to seven months old, according to the breed, and to start laying during the first two weeks of April. If they are sufficiently well grown to lay good-sized eggs, the pullets that lay in January can be very useful, since they will moult and lay again while prices are still good. But those that have not laid by May 31 are bound to prove a loss to the owner, since he can get insufficient returns from them before prices fall for the spring glut. Some that start laying in February or March will prove a disappointment, too, unless they are very well managed as to the feeding, since these arc apt to moult just when egg prices are highest. It is not wise for the novice to "juggle" too much with the feeding of growing pullets, but their hatching date and condition combined must be some guide to the feeding at this time of year—a bulky grain ration with vegetables and good grass range to keep them back, and good class pollard, maize meal, 20 per cent bran and up to 10 per cent meat meal for the late comers, or, better still, milk ad lib. If the farmer's wife has a likely lot of pullets coming along for autumn laying, it will still pay her to preserve eggs for home use during the autumn, when she can expect to get 2/6 a dozen for her fresh eggs. The greatest harm is done to the industry by the housewife who has more eggs than the household can consume in the summer, yet sells them rather than preserves them, and then has to buy eggs when her own hens are not laying in the autumn and winter. It is, they who create the spring glut and low prices rather than the poultry farmer, who sees to it that a large proportion of his eggs are producod in winter. Feeding Values Vary. It is one thing to provide good recipes for stock, at all the different stages, that one has used and found to give the most satisfactory results, but quite another to be sure they 'will always have the same interpretation in feed values. It is usually assumed that average qualities of the different meals will be used, but it often happens that only poor quality is available or that some are higher grade than the usual. New Zealand bran and pollard seem fairly standard, if low, in feed value as these commodities go. But when, as. at this time of year, Australian pollard is available, it contains a much higher percentage of flour, some being almost like wheat. meal. The proportions of bran and pollard used must vary according to these qualities. Bran is, of course, the outside layer of the wheat kernel, but can vary from the large, floury and almost oily flakes of "broad bran," used for race horses, to the sawdusty variety that is the usual poultry feed. We may rule out the high quality bran, since it is seldom procurable and is too expensive, unless for very young chicks. But if the pollard is floury, up to 40, per cent, or even 50 per cent, of bran should be used in the mash, whereas the dry, "chippy" pollard, which leaves no flour on the palm when handled, can be used without bran or with not more than 20 per cent of it in the mash. The use of a big proportion of floury pollard without bran in the birds' mash causes over-fatness, disease of the kidneys, and all the symptoms of too starchy a diet, which end in death if continued. Uses of Other Grains. Maize also varies considerably. The South African maize, which, absurdly enough, still has tp bo imported to this maize-growing country, should always be fed kibbled. Whole, it is very hard to digest. Although the New Zealandgrown maize is larger in the grain, it is much, softer, and, although it is still

better to be kibbled, it does not matter as much as the imported. "White maize should be avoided altogether, as it again is too starchy and also lacks entirely the carotin which makes that grain so valuable, particularly for winter feeding. Of wheat and oats, there are fewer varieties on the market than in countries where more is imported or the growing area greater, but again the Australian wheat is usually much better than the home quality recognised as fit for poultry. There is no reason wliy "tail" wheat should not be used, as long as it is free from mould, smut or rust and it is kept in mind that it has nothing like the same feeding value, weight for weight, as a good sample. Also there is often much weed amongst it, which is not the most useful thing to have thrown on the paddocks, either directly or with the poultry house-litter or droppings.