GAS ATTACK ON HENS

Evening Star, Issue 20989, 31 December 1931, Page 10

GAS ATTACK ON HENS

ROOST RAIDS UP TO DATE Largo numbers of farmers in the poultry farming districts of Novendon and Basildon, near Southend, have suffered extensively of late as a result of thieves who employ motor cars in night raids on the hen roosts. . , , Now nightly watches are being kept by some of the fanners in the hop© of catching tho raiders. Novendon and Basildon are divided by the London-Southcnd arterial road, which gives tho thieves easy access to the poultryfarming district. After a raid they load tho poultry into vans and cars and drive back to town, where, it is believed, tho birds arc sold in the markets in the early morning. fn a recent raid it was discovered that "as had been used to make tho birds unconscious. On another occasion a farmer’s dog, left to guard tho property, had been chloroformed. Local farmers estimate their losses by theft during tho past few months at hundreds of pounds,