POULTRY NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 2410, 10 May 1900, Page 42

POULTRY NOTES.

By -Temiob.

The New Zealand Times say 3: The reaBon the Agricultural department is sending Home for a number of Pekin and Aylesbuiy ducks is that there is such a scarcity of ducks in the colony, and' nearly all of them are in-bred. In the opinion of the poultry expert, there is no class of poultry that needs change of blood more than diieks, and it was on his recommendation that the above step was decided upon. It is thought that the new. strains.- crossed with the slock at present in the colony, will produce really good stock. It may be mentioned -that about 2500 ducks and fowls were exported to the London mav•ket this season. "The birds are reported to. have been all right' as regards weigh b, but in many cases breeders arc -not educated up •to the proper method 01 fattening, and the result was that some of the birds were not -in the best of condition. . Breeders would do well to pay attention to the remarks on the subject of getting the birds into proper pondition for the London market contained in the circular sent out by the Department of 'Agriculture. — Eggs will soon be sold by the pint, quart, 'or gallon, instead of by the dozen." In faot.' the big confectionery establishments in American cities -buy them by the gallon now. ■Kitchen economy suggested the scheme, and lecal packers immediately took it up, How often it is that a cook will break a dozen or more eggs just in order to get the yolks to - make a cake. The whites will be throw n away, or vies versa. . Why not make a saving of the whites or yolks, as the case may be ? was suggested. The packers put the question to the confectioners, and the latter saw .the point. - -Now, according to ihe Kansas City Journal, when a confectioner wants to ■ „make stuff with the yolks he sends to a pack- j ling house, and buys the yolks by the gallon ; if he wants' to use the whites for- something ' lihe sends for them; if he wants to use both ■ j ihe sends and gets a mixed can. . It is predicted that housewives will soon adopt the 'same method. With this new system of {■handling "hen fruit" there is absolutely no loss. The egg shells are even used. They are ground up and sold for' chicken feed. , L — The Stockkeoper is responsible also, as <|ar as I am concerned, for the following: — lApropos of'gamey eggs, it would appear (as- ■ Burning that the paragraphs which have appeared in many of the dailies are anything .like correct) that the unspeakable Boers are -inclined to* indulge in these upon occasion, and with considerable gratification to their •palates. At all events, the notorious Mr .CJronje is credited with a taste for high egtj's 'or extremely youthful chickens, as witiwso (his reported actions when recently he paid a ■■visit to the farm of an Orange Free Stater. (Having duly refreshed himself — the Boer deader, by the way; appears, always ready to do that at the -expense of ' pomeone else — Cronje was about -to ..depart in peace, when lie is said to have espied a hen sitting under an adjacent heap of rubbish. Promptly approaching the bird, he gently raised — at least so the papers say— her wing, and having extracted an 18-days'-old egg from beneath her, slipped its gruesome contents down his throat in triumph, and, evidently enjoying the delicacy, rode, off with, as the chronicler of the event has it, ' "satisfaction depicted on every line of his countenance." Personally, we . . axe, prepared to believe much of the Boers im general," and still more of Cronje in pariticular, but the story of that ]8-days'-old egg sticks in our throat, as we feel convinced the . original must have done in his. A chicken contained -in the egg that had been sat upon for 18 days must have been almost fully fledged, and we defy either Cronje or any other human being to swallow such a* mass. For this reason we decline to swallow jtlie story, themgh wa cheerfully pay tribute to the originality of the liner who invented it, as well as to the faith in human nature 2)ossessed by the sub-editors who let it pas 1 ..