The Poultry Run.

Waipa Post, Volume VIII, Issue 378, 29 December 1914, Page 3

The Poultry Run.

f ♦ -UNCERTAIN SITTERS. When a sitting lien deserts her eggs, as .she sometimes will, it is not only a source o*’ annoyance, but often results in serious loss. Tho failing is more common with pullets than with old hens, and the best way to check it : s to keep the sitter in a dark place, confining her to a neat box, so constructed ..that she cannot easily leave it. Should a lien desert her nest after she lias sat steadily for 10 days or so, there need be no cause for alarm if another sitter can he obtained to cover the eggs in a reasonable time. If tho eggs are left for 24 or 30 hours (unless the weather is - very cold) their vitality will not bo effected. Even at tho tenth day the embryo chick is so far advanced that it will bear considerable cooling and recover. Earlier than this there is a great risk of “dead in tho shell.” IN BREEDING. There are certain occasions when it is necessary to use related .birds in tho breeding pens. In .the formation of a new breed or in the establish-

ment of a new colour, one lias no option but to in-brood, possibly to inbreed very closely, but whenever possible such a practice should bo avoided. Consanguinity nearly always results in the enfeebleinent of the offspring—chickens of related parents are generally somewhat delicate, they arc difficult to rear, and they rarely grow to so largo a size With turkeys, more than any other class of poultry, inbreeding seems to have been practised. I have no hesitation in raving that if healthy, fully-matured, and unrelated stock birds- are used and that if the conditions under which the birds live are favorable, there is very little more difficulty in rearing turkeys than there is in rearing other classes of poultry.

CURE FOR EGG EATING. ,One of the most pernicious of habits that como with poultry keeping is that of the liens eating their eggs It is a discouraging thing to find that your birds aro eating eggs. There are several reasons why they do this. Possibly it is because they are not getting- enough lime, and tho shells aro thin, and at some unfortunate time they have found a broken egg in tho nest and pulled it out and tho lot of them have gone for it. This is but the beginning, for they have learned to eat the eggs, and they will break every egg that they get a elianco at. Many times it comes from a desire for meat food. It is a good plan to feed quite a quantity of raw beef when you have discovered that the birds aro eating eggs. Get some bones from the butcher and hang them in the house where they can get their fill. Even after you have done all you can for them you will have to ho on the lookout all the time, and get the eggs as soon as they aro laid. It is not always tho hen that lays the egg that eats it. but the others are just waiting for her to lay and get out of the nest, and they will crowd about tho place eager for their stolen food. LACK OF EXPERIENCE. In all oases of failure that I have como across-—and I admit they make an unpleasantly large total—there has always been an excellent reason to account for the unsuccessful results that have been achieved. As would be naturally expected, a very common cause of failure among poultry-keepers is lack of experience. So many seem to be under the impression that all it is necessary to do to achieve successful results is to select a breed of fowls, house them in a shed, provide them with some food, and 10, and behold, there is always a plentiful supply of new-laid eggs even during the winter months, and a nice plump chicken for the table whenever needed. How hopelessly mistaken is tin's idea, only those fully realisewho have had experience in the matter.

To succeed with poultry incessant care and attention are necessary, not only during a part of tlio year, but during every one of the three hundred and sixty-five days. It is perhaps in the details of management that the majority go wrong—hatching too early or too late in the season, selecting an unsuitable variety, providing foods that do not contain the right proportion of elements, housing in ill-constructed, bad-ly-lighted, and ill-ventilated buildings, and in a thousand and one other ways is the management wrong. All these matters can only be learnt satisfactorily by experience; obviously all the details of management cannot he mastered in a week or a month. As a matter of fact, there is no branch of agriculture in which greater skill and knowledge are essential factors towards success than in poultry-keeping, and certainly there is no branch in which constant care and ceaseless attention arc more imperatively needed. Until it is fully realised that poultry-keeping is a business requiring skill and experience, the best results will never be achieved. During the moulting period it is most important to* keep the birds ever, on the scratch . Boiling water and kerosene art' splendid things against the ravages of the insect pests. Beginners are not the only ones who have disease in their yards.