POULTRY NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 2561, 15 April 1903, Page 54

POULTRY NOTES.

Bx Tebbob.

ANSWER TO COERESPONDSNT. Inquieeb, N.Z.— lt is altogethei a matter of opinion as to which of the two breeds mentioned is the better ior all-round purposes. Both breeds will cluck, so that either would answer your purpose. Neither will give you the number of eggs you get from the Minorcas, and if your only objection to them is that they do not sit you could get over that drawback by keeping two or three Langshan pullets, as the Largshau-Minorca is a really good cross. —Mr M'Cracken, of Allanton (late Ealfour), has made a gigantic stride forward as regards the quality of his stock since I saw him on my south trip last year. In "White Leghorns he has some tip-top pullets, colour, size, and shape being everything that could bp desired. In Langshans he promises well in cockerels, and one or two pullets are not at all bad. In Minorcas he> is very 6trong in both sexes. One cockerel of this last-mentioned breed is, I should say, one of the handsomest I have seen this season, and I have seen tome good ones. He is a large bird, good in eye and face and in carriage of tail, is of .nice shape, and tight m feather. He carries a strong, straight -comb, with just the slightest indioalioii of pencil spikes, and his lobes are well shaped, have plenty of sultetanee, and will be extremely handsome when, in a month's time, two red patches — merely the bloom of youth — have cleared away. I have not said that this bird is the beat in Otago — there are, of course, many that I have not cccu — nor even that he is the best of the very many strong birds that I have seen coming on for this season's show, but two keen Minorca fanciers who accompanied me on my visit to Mr M'Cracben's were more outspoken. At present I miwt content myeelf with describing the bird as I saw him and the remark that he is a a-edit to the yard he is in, and to Mr Alfred Grant, of Mosgiel, from whose breeding pen he originated. — Anent last week's paragraph respecting fees paid to the oaretakers of birds imported from abroad, I have received several communications from fanciers expressing opinions similar to my own. Oue gentleman forwards me papers showing that the cost of importing a trio, exclusive of the prire paid for the birds, was nearly £8. Surely n i 3 too much to expect anyone to cap costs such as these with a donation cf £3 3s to the butcher, 01 whoever the person may be who had charge during the voyage. —Mr C. B. Roeke, from whose pens a great number of birds have "been imported into New Zealand, reports a very favourable season with his favourite Buff Orpingtons. He has reared a good number of young etock, and they have bred so true to colour that he has very little culling to do. He says: — "I have somewhere about 40 pullets that are fit ,for show, and as they are so -very even in ' quality, colour, etc., it. will be rather, a .difficult matter to pick* out fhe best." In tho past there has been a' tendency for this breed to produce a good percentage of birds which were faulty in colour, but no doubt this will be remedied! 1 ' by careful breeding from selected stock, and colour will become more uniform and fixed as the breed becomes better established. — Amongst come people there ' is an unfortunate impression that fowls which are not laying do not require much feeding. It is quite true that a. bird in full laying consumes a great deal more than at other times; but thiß in no way implies that feeding should be neglected at moulting time. Un the contrary, attention at this period is especially necessary. The birds should, as at all times, be given all that they will pick up quidkly, and it should be of the beet quality. As before mentioned, feathers are highly nitroge-nous, and hence wholesome animal food must form a portion of the diet. The proportion, like the whole quantity, must be a matter for the judgment of the attendant, the appetite of the birds beiaig hie guide. Proper feeding is at all times one of the most essential things to success in poultry-keeping. — Poultry keepers who buy eggs from well-known breeders frequently nave good fortune, while others have extremely bad luck. Often the fault is on the side of the fancier, who disposes of eggs from indifferent etud birds, but more often the cause is through carelessness in the incubation of the egg. "That some people have all the luck whilst others have none at all is often the case. We recently came across an example (says the Stock Keeper). "Two working meu living in the Midlands each invested a hard-earned guinea in a setting of Buff Orpington eggs from the same breeder. One hatched eight ehidkens and the other nine. The eight did not contain a single useful bird among them. Two were, killed for eating, three were sold fo- 5s each, and three pullets w-ere kept for laying. Out of the' other man's nine, he cold a cockerel for £10, two pullets at £5 each, and ihe other six he kept for breeding, there being only two cockerels in the batch. Out of the six ne kept, twe have won first prizes, and his breeding p°n is a very useful one. Who can accouait for suoli luck as tlus?" — In the course of some interesting paragraphs on the subject of that one-time popular amusement, cock-fighting, "Chanticleer," of the Australasian, says : — "That ihe sport has not been killed outright, .he following excerpt of a letter just to hand will show. A fancier in Australia writes to jne as follows: — 'it would surprise people if they knew the amount of cock-fighting that still goes on here. Ido know this, that the real old English game bird, unsullied in its purity, has been bred here foi the past 30 years for fighting purposes aloue. These birds are quite as good in type as recent importations, though, perhaps, a trifle "up" on leg, due to climate.' " Personally I have not had much to do with game cocks as fighting birds. I saw a cock fight ' with steel ' once only. It was fought within a stones -thr ow of the Melbourne Town Hall. I have no particular wish to see another. The birds engaged showed pluck beyond conception. One of them, I remember, made a last effort to engage its opponent, and fell dead in the attempt. The sport of cock-fighting is undoubtedly a cruel one, but it appears to mo it ie not more cruel than are some othci forms ot sport now in vogue. Take the 'gentle art,' for instance, where for the mere relaxation and amusement of a man an unfortunate trout, when pierced by the hook, is ' played ' in its native element until drowned, the operation taking perhaps 10 minutes or a quarter of an hour. The longer the fish fights for its life the better the sport. lam told that even professional followers of the Gentle Master journey into L far countries to. obtain that form of gnort

for their (and the fishes'?) amusement. Are fish insensible to prolonged agony in their Heath struggle^ Or is it merely the old distich over ajia-^n — Compound for sins we are inclined to , By damning those we hay« jio mind to? — Writing of tuberculosis in fowls, Mr W. B. Tcgetmeier cays: — The presence of tubercles in the livers of poultry, more especially those kept in ccarfinement and unhealthy conditions, ha« repeatedly been insisted on in Ac columns of ffie Field, and the recommendation that I have given 'has always been the destruction and cremation of all the affected' birds, the purification of the soil by its being allowed to lie fallow, a-nd the free use of lime or gas lime dug into the earth, to ensure the destruction of the bacilli. Fowls with spotted livers, which are the most prominent symptoms of tuberculosis, seldom, if ever, occur when he birds are kept in healthy, natural conditions, although the disease is hereditary, and tuberculous fowls should never be bred from; fortunately they soon leave off laying. The Board of Agriculture have recently in one of their useful leaflets, which are circulated free of charge, touched on the subject of what is termed "liver disease in poultry." It eets forth that liver disease is the popular name for tuberculosis in gallinaceous birds', and that it is the most common cause of less to poultry owners in most parts of the country. With this latter remark Ido not agree. The infectious disease which was termed by Dr Klein the Orpington disease, from having occurred in a large poultry establishment in that locality, .and is an enteric fever, is certainly,* much more common cause of loss than tuberculosis. Fowls suffering from tubercle of the liver become emaciated, lose their appetite, leave off feeding, and die. On being examined after death the most obvious symptom after the extreme emaciation ie the presence of white spots in the liver. These are sometimes small, and occasionally become as large as hazel nuts. In many cases the other organs of the body are also subject to the presence of these scrofulous tubercles, but whesi the fowl is opened they are always to be eeen, if present, in the liver. The primary cause of the disease js a bacilluß or germ, which is identical with that in the human subject and in quadrupeds. Hence the extreme necessity of keeping fowls away from the neighbourhood of consumptive patients, who are constantly ejecting sputa containing bacilli upon the ground. When fowls are infested with tuberculosis, their faeces - swarm with these bacilli and infect the ground, so that healthy fowls put down in a yard where there are others with liver disease soon become infected. The spread of the disease in thi9 and other countries is lue fco ignorance as to its nature. The birds which die are frequently thrown upon the duoig heap, sometimes they are buried under a few inches of coil, and rarely, if ever, cremated. Then, again, the most frequent cause of the disease 13 the infection of the poultry yard by the droppings of the diseased birds, which contain " the bacilli. Theee contaminate the soil and the food, and the disease spreads rapidly. I have ■never ceased to protest against the dirty apd lazy practice of feeding fowls clay after day cm the same spot, as they have to eat the scattered grain which is^ soiled with their own excrement, the surest way of spreading disease that oan be imagined. It is some safef action to me to see the Board of Agriculture in this leaflet have adopted the conditions -which I have been advocating in the Field fov co many y«ars, but some of the statements in the leaflet appear to be undesirable. It is stated that "it is a common belief that the lisease -is greatly encouraged by the too free U6e of starchy foods, and especially of maize." This is nonsense, because there is no food of poultry that does not in the main consist of starch, and maize only differs from tl.-e other grain in containing a much larger amount of fatty matter. For exterminating the disease thp pamphlet recommends the house to be built with a run in the corner of the field apart from the old poultry yard, that the strong and healthy birds should be put in the new house. We cfieagree altogether with these recommendations, which are obviously not thosp of a practical poultry keeper. If a stock is infected with tubercle, and they are all of the same breed, the best plan is the destruction of the whole and the breeding of healthy birds in an entirely new locality. No hens should be allowed to live about which doubt, may exist. The final passage with regard to the euro of tuberculosis is ra-cdt heresy against all Banitary science. The idea of attempting to cure fowls with spotted liver or tuberculosis, as recommended in the following •paragraph, is one which we should never have expected to find in a pamphlet issuing from the Board of Agriculture: — It is probable, as in the case with mammalian tuberculosis, thai a cure will often result from improved conditions and removal from fresh sources of infection, and should a cure be attempted, that is the only direction which it should take. The recommendation hat a tuberculous fowl, abounding in the bacilli which produce the disease, can be cured by removal from fresh sources oF infectictn. when it is itself a source of inflection to all other fowls around it, is one of the most absurd suggestions it is possible to conceive. A tuberculous fowl will produce tuberculous progeny, while itr droppings on tlie jjround will tend to spread the disease, and that any such cure should be attempted is a suggestion replete with danger. If a poultry yard in infected with tubercles there is but one «>.mcifint remedy, and that is the removal of all the infeoUd animals which are umfit for human food, and the utter purification of the locality. The length of time the bacilli remain alive in the soil and affect the liewcomers is, unfortunately, a subject on which we have yet very iittle information. But that the attempt to cure tuberculous fowls that are unfit for human food and oan only produce unhealthy progeny should be recommended by the Board of Agriculture is to be regretted.