POULTRY NOTES

Evening Star, Issue 23496, 9 February 1940, Page 3

POULTRY NOTES

[By Dtilitt-Fanot.]

'ANSWER TO CORRESPONDENT. “ Beginner.”—By Act of Parliament passed in 1933, poultry-keepers (with soma few exceptions) who have more than 24 layers and who sell eggs are required to register their hens, paying ' 2s 6dl per 100 birds or part of that number. The money thus raised is used by the New Zealand Poultry Board for the organisation and development or ■ the industry. j ‘ DUNEDIN UTILITY POULTRY CLUB. At the January meeting of this club one of the members (Mr C. Bartley) examined birds showing such detects, deformities of various descriptions, and explained the causes and the methods of curing or preventing. At this month’s meeting L. Jourdam, Government poultry inspector, will exhibit a “ movie talkie ” picture dealing with diseases, and will answer question*. MOULTING. Shortly many birds will be in the moult: indeed, many are shedding their feathers already. Poultry-keepers MT6 warned not •to reduce tho iood supply because no eggs are being laid. When fowls are not laying they do not eat:so much, but they should get all they will eat, and when moulting they ace not in a condition .to standi underfeeding. The birds during the moult ■ require food which will help them to regain their feathers and to regain them with ease. Feed, a mash of a more tasty pature to induce them to eat, such as boiled meat, using tho meat andl the soup therefrom for mixing with the pollard and bran. During tho moult give a little powdered sulphur at the rate of a teaspponful for each five birds. ... Stone grit ia important at all times; hut at no time is it more essential than during the moult. It probably entails more strain on a bird’s constitution to produce a new coat of feathers than to fay eggs, and stone grit supplies the matter which serves the combined! purpose of keeping the birds healthy and enabling them to digest all their food. Stone grit (silica) is needed in feathermaking. AN IDEAL POULTRY YARD. Such a yard should be big enough to divide into two with gates by winch the flock can run in which, ever yard the owner desires them far do so. While one yard is in. use dig up the other, break up the sods, sprinkle a layer of air-slacked lime, plant with , oats, and again spade. By the 'time the oats in the one yard have furnished the flock with many succulent meals and is used up another crop of oats is ready for them in the other yard, or run. , Air-slack lime and a. growing crop keeps the ground 'sweet and prevents disease-. The poultry yard can still be ideal, however, if large enough, and is divided as described if it is simply grass- . bearing, because there is still the possibility .of giving each part in turn a considerable rest. Fowls like grass and it is good , for them if kept short, but it is not relished when they have occupied it for any - length of time. If spelled for a few weeks ?o as to he cleaned by .rain it is once more palatable. . . Long grass, if,,swallowed -may „.icausa crop-ihinajngi lv : '^AIB’HUNCrER., A Home poultry expert advises giving chickens salt, because, he says, it is a natural constituent of blood and ■ also because ho has found it to bo very useful ,in other ways. A chicken in a flock having salt might bleed and yet conie to no harm from the other fowls, whilst another in a flock with no salt will quickly be pecked to death by the salt-hungry companions. In the same’ way it is useful in helping to check cannibalism among adults. The cost of salt is negligible in relation to its value in a mash. Valuable as salt is, it should, however, be used very sparingly. One ounce is sufficient in the mash for 100 fowls and it should be ■ ; dissolved in : water before mixing. Too much salt is poisonous. A SIMPLE KEROSENE EMULSION. To make this boil a gallon of water with a pound of soft soap and stir in ■ two pints of kerosene. This emulsion is good for spraying the poultryhouse, , perches, nest boxes, and floor just after you have thoroughly cleaned out the dropped feathers, nest material, etc. Insect vermin are destroyed by kerosene emulsion, so don’t stint it. DO SURPLUS COCKERELS PAY? Dealing with the question of table - poultry as a side line to egg production a Home producer sought information from 14 English county instructors as to the breeds most suitable, and whether it was a paying proposition to keep surplus cockerels for table. Rhode Island Reds, White Wyandottes, and Light Sussex were in all cases tho birds preferred, and out of tho 14 instructors ' the reply to the question “ Are. surplus cockerels profitable?” only two answered definitely “ No.” In one case the answer was: ‘‘ No records available,” and another said; ‘‘On poultry farms, yes, on generals farms, • no.” THE BREEDING PEN, It is not too early to start setting up the breeding pen. Let the birds have time to settle down and become acquainted. DAILY REQUIREMENTS. It can be definitely stated that a laying hen (note the word “ laying ”) requires daily tho equivalent of an ounce and a-half of pollard and bran and two ounces of wheat. During wartime wheat, pollard, and bran may become expensive and uneconomical to feed to poultry, and if so substitutes considered equivalent ” to them should be used. . In addition the hen needs animal food and this can be supplied .by mincing blood and bone meal—which, by the by, should not,rise in price in view of the fact that slaughtering of cattle for export to supply the needs of the English market should smake it plentiful and cheap. Fowls on range will, of course, obtain substitutes for meat by gathering worms and insects. If fowls do, not gat meat in some form production in dry seasons will certainly fall. The amount of grain and mash indicated as necessary for a laying ben is merely a guide. Watch the fowls, note what they eat greedily, and see that they leave no food in the trough. It is necessary to watch, because some birds eat more than the others, with the re-

suit that the slower eaters do not get enough. Another important matter is to see that tho birds get variety; another is to see that the meals are fed regularly. WHY GEESE WEAR SHOES. In certain districts of Central Europe the keeping of geese is a very important industry. Sooner or later the birds get fat and then are taken to market. In some localities' the■ geese are- conveyed by road transport,, but in other districts the birds are driven to the_town. This sometimes means a journey of miles oyer country roads, and prior to the opening of the market the highways are almost blocked for a considerable distance by the flocks of the big white birds. An interesting feature of the trip is that before starting the birds are shod in a most curious manner. At the first step a fairly level and hard piece of ground is smeared with tar. The geese are driven over the sticky surface until their feet become coated with tar, and then on to an adjoining plot of ground covered with sand. The result is that the birds’ feet are covered with a mixture of tar and sand, which after a few hours running about on grass dries into a hard coating. This gives the feet of the geese a much-needed protection against the hard roads. POT EGGS IN THE NEST BOX. During a recent inspection of a number of small poultrykeepers’ runs, says Henry Strike in ‘Eggs’ (England), 1 noticed that in the nest of every cabin visited reposed a pot egg. The result was that most of the novice poultrymen were gravely concerned about the number of cracked eggs they were taking from the nests, and they had various theories to advance in explanation. The most popular one was that one or more birds were clumsy with their feet. When it was suggested that if the pot egg was removed from the nest more sound eggs could be picked up, the hint was treated with scorn. Without the pot egg to inspire them how could fowl be expected to lay! That was a general view, too. The lake egg was regarded as a genuine incentive to the pullets. Pot eggs have some use, but they certainly do not encourage birds to lay, and just as certainly are they tho frequent cause of cracked eggs when they have a place in the small communal nest which, of necessity, has to serve many small poultry cabins. The pot egg should be utilised as a temporary guide, not as a permanent inspiration. When new birds come to a new house and a nest is fashioned, the presence of a pot egg in it helps to convey to the extremely limited intelligence of the birds that here is a suitable spot in which to lay. Once birds have familiarised themselves with the nest—and after two or three have used it, it can be taken for granted that the nest will be utilised as intended —the pot egg should be removed. This allegiance to an old-fashioned practice demonstrates how very deeply some .of these things have implanted themselves. Here are people who have no previous knowledge of poultry, yet somehow they contact the knowledge of generations gone. Reference to placing pot eggs in the nest are to lie discovered in poultry literature which was current 150 or 160 years ago, when these nest furnishings were regarded as positively essential if eggs had to be secured. Apparently such advice was never questioned till comparatively recent times; but, though its worthlessness has been proved and confirmed, tradition overpowers the wider knowledge of modern experience, and possibly pot eggs will be regarded as necessities for decades to come. However, there is no reason why eggs should be needlessly cracked by adhering to an old idea that has been exploded in practice.