THE CARE OF CANARIES.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume VIII, Issue 47, 21 November 1891, Page 615

THE CARE OF CANARIES.

BY

MRS M. C. WILLIAMS.

In the care of canaries in the home, cleanliness even outranks godliness. Given that, with proper food and reasonable freedom from bad air, your bird’s days will be long in the land, bis song a delight to you eleven months in the year. Do not expect a canary to sing while moulting. The growth of his fine new winter coat requires all the surplus vitality of his small body. Feed him liberally with some good prepared bird-food, keep him clean and quiet, and nature will do the rest. For steady feeding give mixed seed, two parts rape to one of canary. Give a little fresh lettuce everyday, a bit of apple three times a week. Wash the cage floor, bath, and so on, every morning. Put in fresh gravel three times a week. Ise the regular birdgravel if you can get it. If not, clean, shaip, river gravel, almost as fine as sand will do. Once a week, give a feed of hard-boiled egg, taking care to remove it before it becomes stale. In place of it, you may with advantage sometimes give bread soaked in new milk and squeezed nearly dry. A cleft pepper-pod hung at the side of the cage, is a help to both appetite and digestion. So is a spray of pepper grass, taking care not to let it hang too long. If your bird is hoarse, soak the pepper-pod in milk and let birdie eat and drink of the combination.

As you love your bird, keep him away from draughts. They are as deadly almost as cats, and even more cruel. Hang your cage outside, not in the window, first putting a shade over the top of it. Sunshine is an excellent good thing for your pet, but the rays must not beat too long nor too full upon his feather cap. Never leave him overnight up toward the top of a room in which gas jets have been burning. Hot, foul air always ascends, and will make short work of him in much less than a night. In hot weather give a bath every day. In cold, eveiy other day is better. No matter what the season, be sure that he has a sheltered place to get dry in. Every year bronchitis slays its thousands, yea, tens of thousands, and more than half contract it by perching in a draught while damp. With the right sort of gravel, cuttie fish bone is not absolutely essential. It is very well though, to keen a bit within reach. Take care though that nothing eatable corrodes the wires. Verdigris is the result—a potent poison for birds or men.

The finest singing birds are brought over from Germany. It is, however, entirely and easily possible to raise very good ones from imported stock. Choose birds of different strains, give them a big eage with a gourd or cocoanut shell swung in one corner, and warmly lined with wool and hair. When the birdlings come out of the shell, put in a plentiful supply of cracker and hard-boiled egg grated and mixed in

equal quantity. It must be prepared fresh twice a day, as it sours easily, and is then poison to the tender nestlings. Leave both parents to care for them until they aie feathered and can go into a cage of their own, when the old folk will probably set up a new family at the old stand. Young birds begin to sing at about four months old. The full voice comes at seven or eight. As soon as they begin to chirp ami twitter, borrow, buy or beg, a line songster, put him with them in a loom to themselves, but in separate cages, and see how they will give him the sincere flattery of imitation. Next to draughts ami improper feeding, vermin are the roots of all the ills bird-flesh is heir For each, prevention is the best cure. Bird-lice harbour in the cage itself by daylight. Oil of any sort is death to them. If you have reason to suspect them, take your bird out of the cage, wash and scald it thoroughly, then oil all the top with sweet oil or good fresh lard. If your bin! droops and lacks appetite, put a rusty nail into his drinking fountain, and mix a little coarselypowdered charcoal with the gravel on his floor. Take thought for him in sharp changes of weathei. (Jive him shade ami air when the thermometer goes up to ninety. Throw a blanket over the cage when it gets toward freezing. Keep him as nearly as possible at the Irishman’s ‘ middle extreme ’ and your portion shall be morns of music, days of joy-