POULTRY NOTES

Dominion, Volume 22, Issue 52, 24 November 1928, Page 32

POULTRY NOTES

(By “New Laid.”) Advices ,to hand report that the shipment of eggs which left New Zealand by the Corinthic arrived at London in satisfactory condition, and prices realised have been from 18s. 6d. to 21s. per long hundred (ten dozen), according to weight. Building Up a Strain. How long a time is required to establish a strain will > depend upon the number of the peculiarities of the characteristics by? which the strain is distinguished. If a breeder sets out to build a strain on a single characteristic, he is likely to accomplish his work much more quickly than if he attempted to build it on several characteristics, because he will find more specimens possessing the single characteristic than with the several desired characteristics. In other words, he will have more materials to work with. Some characteristics are fixed and become transmissible more quickly than others. White in plumage -is a characteristic easily fixed and easily transmissible. Great prolificacy, on the other hand, requires a much longer time to secure and render it transmissible. It will then be difficult, or, to be more accurate, impossible, to name a fixed period which will be sufficient in which to build up a Strain. It is fairly safe, however, except in cases of marvellous prepotency, to say that not less than five years will be required, and that if there are several distinguishing characteristics, probably seven, ten, or more years will be necessary.

Success With Chickens. Full success with chickens requires that they be kept growing from the shell to maturity. The slightest check is a loss than cannot be made good. Growing chickens is exacting work. One must get up early in the morning (unless he adopts the method of the breeder who said it was not necessary to get up early if one sat up late enough planning how to get the work done without early rising). The beginner cannot expect to do uniformly good work. With the be ; st of instruction advice, and attention mistekes will sometimes occur. Tips for Turkey-keepers. t 1

Turkey hens will be found to mother and care for poults better than the ordinary hen. For best results it is necessary to feed turkey chicks five or six times a day for the first fortnight.

On no account permit the turkey hen to range with her chicks at will until they are at least two weeks old. If turkey hens are molested at hatching time, crushed chicks are certain to result.

It is essential that animal food—to the extent of eight or ten per cent, of the whole be included in all mashes fed to poults. Where ordinary hens are requisitioned for hatching turkey eggs, it will be found inadvisable to entrust them with more than nine eggs. Feed a liberal supply of chicken grit to the young poults ,by scattering it on a board on which their soft food is placed. Young poults cannot stand a . wetting during the early days of their existence, nor can they successfully endure the amount of exercise that their mother is prone to give them when granted full liberty. For the first week or two poults should be fed on custard made from beaten up eggs and milk, to which is added a little oatmeal and finely chopped green stuff. To minimise all risk of severe wettings it will be found good policy to provide an open shed of roomy dimensions to which the young turkeys can resort in time of need. The most troublesome period in the life of young turkeys is that between three and ten weeks’old. From that time on they begin to roam until they “shoot the red.” It is a mistake to attempt to feed young turkeys until they are at least forty-eight hours old. During , that time they should be felt undisturbed in the nest in which they were hatched. Of all green foods that can be supplied, onion tops or leeks will be found the best.

The points to be born in mind in turkey raising are cleanliness, sweet, wholesome food, regularity in time of feeding, the supply of plenty of milk, grecu food and grit,. The Essentials for Success.

It requires energy, patience, and determination to build up a thoroughly profitable and extensive poultry farm. There are disagreeable features about poultry culture—but while you are thinking, name any avocation in life that fails to present difficulties and disagreeable features.

One Meal a Day. Farmer poultrymen are very apt to think that during the summer the laying hens can get their living by roaming the fields in search of worms, grasshoppers, and scattered grain. It is true that they will pick up a lot of such food, but thev should have at least one good grain feed daily. That should be at night, just before roosting time. It will be found that the difference between the full and empty egg basket is caused by the evening grain ration.

Utilise Waste Bread. Bread crusts can be used profitably by being toasted through in a hot oven, and then ground up to an edible size. They can then be scalded and dried off with pollard. Treated in this way they are more palatable and more profitable than when fed in the ordinary way. What Governs Leg Colour? Yellow legs in most breeds set them off splendidly, but a first-rate yellow leg in some breeds and varieties is not easily accomplished. When got, it is not easy to keep, but I am altogether at variance with those who everlastingly put the blame on limestone soil and the like, I believe there is absolutely nothing in it, writes “Optimist” in an exchange. An . ounce of practice is worth a pound of theory. I go out in my naddocks and I see Wyandottes perched about on the limestone with the most delightfully coloured legs at eight to ten months old, and some, alas, with defective ones, but I know it is the breeding and not the soil. If it were the soil or the feeding, why are some better than others? Some have never had a rich colour. Then I turn to the old birds not on limestone, but penned on good, rich soil. The colour of the leg has faded, but why? Age, sun. wind, and rain, are the reasons, for once they had good colour. It has bleached out, through the elements. No, yellow food has not been able to keep it. . Age has a lot to do with the failure of all richly coloured things. Sunlight alone is a powerful factor in destroying colour, be it leg colour or the colour of our, carpets or curtains.