POULTRY KEEPING

Press, Volume LXIX, Issue 20989, 18 October 1933, Page 14

POULTRY KEEPING

PIGEONS AND CAGE BIRDS [By FANCIER.] ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS Fancier, Opawa.—You have either two hens or two cocks. I will have a look. Some cage birds seem to be shy in taking colour feed. A few drops of orange juice or aniseed will help to make them like it. NOTES To-morrow the annual show of the Ellesmere Agricultural and Pastoral Association will be held at Leeston. Exhibits may be sent by the morning passenger train from Christchurch, and can be taken home again in the train which leaves after the show. The Christchurch Poultry Club will meet on Tuesday, October 24, instead of Monday next. There will be a social in the Christchurch Club rooms on Saturday night. Mr H. W. Boyns will attend to take entries for the Metropolitan Agricultural and Pastoral show to be held at Adclington, on November 9 and 10. Mule breeding is a pleasure which delights many fanciers, and this is a good month to start. There is a special cross of canary hens, and the muler knows what sort does best. The male finch to pair with a canary is all the better for being housebred. Though there are many kinds of finches that will pair to a canary, I prefer the goldfinch. Mr A. 11. Osman, who had charge of pigeons in the Great War, says in one of his books : "Mr N. Barker's most wonderful stock hen sold to J. W. Logan had a history, and her name was Marcia ; this is Flemish for Mary. She came as a stray, and entered Barker's loft as a squeaker. She stopped and raced, and was the most famous stock hen that Barker ever owned. He called her Marcia (Mary) after his favourite daughter." Metropolitan Show. Farmers and fanciers who take an interest in poultry should find attractions at the Metropolitan Show of the Canterbury Agricultural and Pastoral Association to be held at Addington on November 9 and 10. The schedule is an attractive one, there being classes for the most popular varieties of big fowls and bantams, including ducks and classes for eggs. In addition there are classes for both hens and ducks that have laid a certain number of eggs in the competitions of the New Zealand Utility Poultry Club. There are also classes for trios of both light and heavy breeds, each trio to comprise two females and one male. The New Zealand Utility Poultry Club has given special prizes of 10s for the best light breed, 10s for the best heavy breed and 10s for the best duck or drake for members of the Club. The New Zealand Rhode Island Red and Orpington Club lias offered, where three members compete, 10s (3d for the best Rhode Island Red and 10s 6d for the best Orpington, and the Agricultural and Pastoral Association, in addition to the ordinary prizes, offers a special of £ 1 Is for the best bird in the show. The judges are : Messrs T. S. Dove (light breeds), J. R. Griffin (heavy breeds), R. W. Hawke, M.P. (ducks), and J. D. Gobbe (open classes). Entries close on Saturday and may be made with Mr M. E. Lyons; at the rooms of the Agricultural and Pastoral Association, 151 Worcester street, or with Mr H. W. Eoyns, Christchurch Poultry Club rooms, Colombo street.

The Breeding Season. The poultry farmer has been hard at work since July producing pullets to keep up or replace the stock, and for the sale, in many instances, of day-old chicks. The replacements mostly will be pullets that will be expected to come into lay about April. To have them ready in April means the pullets will be fit for the laying tests, and last year's pullets shifted to the secondyear hen class. The day-old chick trade relieves many of the work done in the breeding season, but it is a great tax on the time and convenience of the poultry farmer, whose work of tens involves many thousand chicks. Half may be estimated to be cockerels, of which a few only will be kept and a few, perhaps, sold.

Raising Stock. Though the work of raising stock to replace the layers, chiefly in April, is a great tax, the breeding of birds is not finished. Breeding will not stop when the pullets desired for starting laying in April are out and about. There is still much for the fancier and farmer to do. The race meetings will demand many table birds. Bantam men are sure to hatch late in order to keen down size, and pigeon fanciers will go on until the moult starts. Cage bird breeding has really just begun, and that, too, will go on until the moulting season, which usually starts in January. Before that time it is well to get rid of the old birds in case the heat and the moult takes them off. Age and the dropping of feathers is a combination that needs stamina and resistance.

! Popular Budgerigars. With Budgerigars so popular in all parts of the Commonwealth, and societies already formed in three of the principal States, the time seems opportune for the formation of a federation or governing body of these clubs for deciding of ail questions appertaining to exhibiting, the issue of a quarterly report, and generally popularising this section of the fancy. At present the only effort that has been made to do anything at all of a standard nature was that of Mr Terrill in the issue of his booklet on Nomenclature says S. Clifford in " Poultry." Budgerigar breeders are losing valuable time in neglecting to organise both from an exhibition and commercial point of view. I am repeatedly urging breeders to try for the overseas markets, especially America, where fancy prices are being paid for all colours, and with the Budgerigar essentially Australian it will appeal to aviculturists generally. There is also a good field in New Zealand. The Export Trade The number of eggs for export will, m numbers, be ahead of past shipments, but the returns give anything but a good promise of being as good as in any year in the past. Mr Robender, the nrnnv ; ~ or of Sydney "Poultry," found the Australian produce was unpopular greatly to his surprise. Several authorities of repute tell of a decline in price and also a decline in demand. Sir Edward Brown comes to the conclusion that the British are eating less eggs and producing more,, thus the outlook i

for the Dominion's shipments is not as good as one would like. The partial cause can be put down to the big decrease in purchasing power. Egg-eating Campaign. There has been an egg campaign in several countries, and there was to be one in New Zealand a year or two ago, but nothing was done. This may have been due to lack of energy or to the fact that poultrymen 'were well off. It may be necessary yet. If everyone would eat two more eggs in the year there would be no surplus and prices would be higher than ever realised for export eggs last year. To eat two more eggs each looks easy, and it is easy. There are thousands who rarely eat an egg, because they don't know the food value of them. The public should be told and poultrymen should do the telling, or most of it. There are many ways of telling, but I was in favour of an egg campaign at the time. Unfortunately the State was paving a handsome subsidy to poultrymen and nothing was done. Do Brown Shells Sell Best? Is it a fact that the London eggtrade shows any distinct prefere.ee for all dark-shelled eggs or are prepared to pay any more lor them .' It is frequently stated in Australia that a case of all dark brownshelled eggs would realise more by 2d a dozen on London floors than is paid for white-shelled eggs ! Is such an opinion correct ? These are the questions I fired off at an unsuspecting London wholesale distributor and awaited his reply writes George N. Robender in Sydney "Poultry." He smiled broadly at first, probably at my earnestness, then looked serious and replied: "If I could receive consignments of all brown eggs from someone, I would be pleaded to have them for sale—but I doubt if I could obtain the extra 2d a dozen! They certainly would sell more readily to some particular class of retailer, but to others again they would not. For an all-brown-shelled pack particular buyers will pay Gd or Is premium to the ten dozen, but packs of mixed-coloured shells, distinct white and brown, in about equal proportions, combine to make the most attractive pack and sell more readily at the current rate. The contrast is striking and pleasing to buyers.