POULTRY NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 3196, 16 June 1915, Page 63

POULTRY NOTES.

By Terror.

The Show season is not quite over yet, although Dunedin has got through with its own Particular fixture. Many fanciers are still in tho throes of expectation as regards their chances at country exhibitions; but shows to come or shows past, all are now giving thought—though mid-winter is not on us yet—to questions of mating and-of hatching. Now is the time to see that every preparation is made for the successful rearing of next season’s stock. If incubators, brooders, etc., were not thoroughly cleaned and disinfected at the end of last season, as they should have been, that very necessary work should be undertaken and thoroughly performed now, otherwise they may be called into requisition when other matters are too urgent, to allow of tha work being done as effectively as it should he; anch as a result, diseases may affect the young flocks. , As I have pointed out at this tune of the year for several seasons back, the most serious troubles and diseases met with in the >rearing of chickens are traceable to mismanagement and the neglect of precautionary methods. Want of cleanliness : s one of the chief causes of losses, _ overheating of incubators and brooders is another, and improper feeding and overfeeding, lack of exercise in suitable quarters are nil contributing causes to disease; and irregularity in attention to any detail militates adversely when otherwise all the conditions are satisfactory. A very important factor to success _ in the chicken-rearing season is the selection of the eggs to be hatched from birds of robust constitution only; and when good yields of eggs are looked for from the new stock, the parents themselves must 1 ' have been good layers. To this latter statement

tiio remark may be added that, however good layers tue producing hens may have neen, tile chickens will not equal tnem m quality unless tiie male bird mated with tnem was hatched Horn a properiy-mated and good-laying stock. Headers may iiave noted that in the report published a few weeks back on the lesson learned by a series of experiments conducted at an American experimental station, the very interesting paragraph relative to lime —viz., “Lane from bone, in itself, has little or no effect upon increasing assimilation of nitrogen, and that lime from hone is not as easily assimilated as lime from phosphate rock. This was verified in every instance, and the difference was very pronounced.” I draw attention to this matter now because at the season of hatching it is most important that the laying hens and their chickens should bo supplied with lime in the most convertible form, otherwise weak legs, poor frames, etc., are bound to be prevalent in the brooders and subsequently. —lt is in the brooder stage that overcrowding is most likely to be permitted, and this is because of the rapid growth of the chickens. . A space which is ample for them one week is too cramped the next. I have myself seen many' illustrations of this. One day you are asked to admire the healtny appearance of a brooder full of chickens, and you cannot help speaking your admiration; but when a week later you are asked to look again you are not asked to admire, but to explain, if you can, what has gone wrong. You find that they are receiving the same attention as formerly, yet are not progressing, and some have died. Of course, you. have to explain that if the chickens are not removed to larger quarters they will all die, and that even if some survive they will never be a credit to the owner.

Chickens do 'well in an enclosed space for a time, but they progress quicker when they are strong enough to fossick for themselves, if they are allowed an open run quite separate from the old fowls. Don’t allow any corners in the bro'orler. because chickens are apt to crowd into them at night,- and those in the very corner get smothered. Thousands of chickens have been lost in this way, and I have known of hundreds being lost from large mobs in a single night. Most of us who are gardeners know what yellow feverfew is, but we may not know it under the name of yellow pyrethrum ; yet it is from this plant that the pyrethrum powder is manufactured for sale, and which is so deadly to insect life, especially such as attacks the sitting hen and her little brood, sucking the blood of both. The old pyrethrum plants of the garden are hardy, and survive a fairly severe winter, but grow too coarse for another year’s decoration of flower borders. For this reason gardeners generally pull it all up out of the bods in the autumn and cast it on the rubbish heap with other debris. But the poultry-keeper should make friends with the gardener and beg it. He can tie it in bunches and dry it like mint and sage, or he can plant it in his bit of ground fill spring. Then, either in its fresh or its dried state, he can use it freely in the making of his nests for the broodies, and ho will no longer be plagued with obnoxious insects.

The New Zealand Utility Poultry Club’s eleventh egg-lay mg competition— April 8, 1915, to May 31, 1916 (six hens to a pen —completed its ninth week on June 8 as follows : Light breeds: 1. Mr E. Mills, Woodhaugh (W.L.) .. .. 231 2. A. E. Wilson. Shirley (W.L.) 230 3. Glencoe Poultrv Ranch, Karori (W.L.) 210 4. Mrs J. Mills (W.L.) .. 210 4. Master Jack Green, St. Albans (W.L.) 210 5. Vorral Bros., Swannanoa (8.L.) .. .. 195 6. Waikato Egg Farm, Hamilton (W.L.) 186 7. Dalmuir P. Yards, Waltjiam (W.L.) .. 185 Heavy breeds: 1. E. Willis, New Brighton (B.O.) .. .. 171 2. Cooper & Wainscott, Spreydon (E.1.R.) 167 3. W. Bloomfield, Auckland (B.O.) .. .. 161 4. T. Kennedy, Eangiora (W.W.) .. .. 151 Indian runner ducks: 1. Glencoe Poultry Ranch, Karori 249 1. W. Knight, Hutt 249

The 49 pens in the light breeds (294 birds) have laid in the seven weeks a total of 5948 eggs; the 11 pens of heavy breeds (66 birds) have laid 1015 eggs; and the Indian runner ducks (eight pens, 48 birds) have laid 1103 eggs.