POULTRY YARD

Taranaki Daily News, 26 March 1932, Page 20 (Supplement)

POULTRY YARD

BY

G. H. AMBLER

SMALL POULTRY-KEEPERS.

Every small poultry-keeper should know the condition of his birds in order to be sure that the feeding is correct. I am afraid that many tons of food are wasted every year through feeding blindly by rule of thumb; far too many give 4oz. a day year in and year out regardless of whether the birds requiie more or less. Even relying on egg production may lead one astray, ,so .1 will try to give a few hints which will enable keepers of poultry to combine the egg results with actual condition and use the two as a guide to feeding. Healthy birds should be active and have a hard, tight appearance, with bright sheen on the feathers, a bright red comb, face and wattles, always alert and ready for their food every time, never sluggish or miserable in appearance. These are outward signs and can be observed daily. As often as. may be convenient—say, once a fortnight handle your 'birds. It does not take many minutes to go through a few birds at night, when they are on the perch, to find out that they are neither too fat nor too thin, and one very quickly becomes accustomed to overweight or underweight.

SIGNS OF HEALTH AND WEAKNESS

A bird in good, healthy, laying condition should have plenty of flesh on the breast bone, but not too much fat in the abdomen. In, feeling the latter with your fingers it should be soft and pliable and well-developed; you will find in your best layers it handles like a silk bag of eiderdown. Birds that have an abdomen like a football or bladder of lard are too fat, and the feeding and management need attention; maybe you are giving a fattening diet or overfeeding, or perhaps you are not giving sufficient exercise. On the other band, you may find some with shrunken abdomens and very little flesh on the breast, and these will require more or better food.

In going through a pen of birds in this way careful note should, be taken of average condition; for instance, in a. dozen you may find ten in the pink of condition and two very fat. Naturally you would not cut down or alter the food to try to get the two right, but rather consider that- these two were of a coarse, lazy type, likely to fatten under almost any conditions. These should be watched as regards egg-production, and, if not “paying their way” used for the table.. Again, supposing you found all the birds but one on the fat side and that one very light and thin, you would consider that the one was in ill-ihealth and needed individual attention, while the remainder would need, better management. Condition depends on the owner, and the more attention the small poultrykeeper gives to feeding and management the more pleasure and profit he or she will get out of the hobby.

REPLACING CONSTANT WASTAGE.

•Four points to remember in poultry feeding are: (1) Birds require nourishing food; (2) 'bulky food; (3) clean, palatable food; and (4) easily digested food. The object of feeding is to replace the' constant wastage in frame, flesh, fat, horn, blood and feathers, and last, but not least, to keep up vitality and produce eggs. This sounds a lot, but it is quite simple to those who take a keen enough interest in their birds to note any signs of poor health or lack of condition.

A short time ago I attended a lecture on poultry-feeding, and heard one speaker advise wet mash as the best system, to be followed by another who tried to make it quite plain that the dry mash system is “the one and only,” and yet another who suggested that the two combined would give best results. I mention this to make it quite clear that there is no one and only way of feeding poultry; different people have different views and different methods, and what gives excellent results to one may give very poor results to another. Personally, I think it is not so much whether a mash is wet or dry, but what the mash consists of that is so important, as is also the quality of the ingredients.

UNDERSTANDING THE ELEMENTS.

Just to make it quite'clear what I mean, if you are given a formula for a mash make certain whether the parts are by weight or measure, because, as you will readily understand, with light ingredients like Bran and lucerne meal this point will make all the difference. Also be sure that the quality of each ingredient is as good as possible. If you are trying the dry mash system make sure you are using a good mash', which the birds like, and also know What quantity they eat. 'Some people hang up a hopper of dry mash in the house, open it for two or three hours daily, but never worry about the quantity eaten. Possibly it has some ingredient that has gone musty, and, not being palatable, the birds are not eating £oz., of it per day; . but the owner says “in three hours they ought to eat 20z., so I will give loz. grain in the morning and loz. at night.” The result is that the birds are getting only sufficient food for bodily needs, then there are no 6ggs, and the dry mash system is condemned. It all depends on the management of the owner in selecting his mash and knowing just how much his birds are eating; the personal element is there and it is up to us.

BUILD BUSINESS BY ADVERTISING.

No commercial enterprise dependent upon public patronage has grown to satisfactory proportions without the use of advertising. Large concerns spend hundreds of thousands of pounds annually to get their products before the public, and they do many millions of additional business as the result. Every successful breeder of fowls, every successful manufacturer of incubators, every successful poultry food manufacturer owes his success to advertising. No matter how ; successful a breeder or a manufacturer may be in producing what the people use, his sales will not bring a profit unless he lets the people know about his goods. CARE OF THE (PULLETS. . The pullets must not be overcrowded if they are to lay throughout the winter, and remember it is the winter eggs that pay. Look to their housing accommodation at . once and see that the ventilation is satisfactory. Pullets that are very slow growers and feather 'badly should be thinned out, because although we do not .want the precocious pullet for producing eggs, we do not, all the same, want a bird practically to stand still.

The best time of a hen’s life for breeding purposes is during her second season, when her production is still at a good rate and her physical condition should be at its highest standard. Charcoal, apart from being a splendid corrective, aids digestion, and is an excellent. preventive of disease.