A MISTAKE IN FEEDING POULTRY.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3172, 29 August 1881, Page 4

A MISTAKE IN FEEDING POULTRY.

I have been annoyed at times beyond endurance in my endeavors to have my work done just as I direct. In no one instance is this annoyance greater than in my almost futile attempts to have my poultry cared for in a way that shall show some little regard for my wishes in the matter. I have a large flook of heis —mature birds, all of them, not fancy specimens, but just such hens as any farmer would keep, and I try to keep them well; but all my suggestions, wishes, and even positive orders, avail nothing to prevent them from being fed almost exclusively upon sloppy food. The trouble is j\ist here—people raising poultry got in the habit of feeding young chickens on soft food, and as they grow to maturity follow up the practice. This practice is very faulty ; chickens are young, indeed, when they cannot consume some solid food, such as the smaller grains. It is true that young chickens will do much better for a time upon soft food, but the proportion >f solid food should be increased as the •hicks attain larger growth. The mere Pact that all kinds of poultry, both young md old, devour all kinds of sloppy, washy food with avidity proves nothing, as will be speedily found by comparing the increase in weight or productive capacity with the unusual quantity of soft food devoured. The reason for all this should bo plain to the most casual observer; soft food, as usually made, is lacking in the nourishment required by poultry. The attempt to fatten fowls upon this sort of food is never satisfactory. The laxity that is the result of a continued diet of soft food very seriously interferes with the egg-prouueing capacity of the best layers in the world. Now, Ido not wish to have it inferred that I want my hens always fed upon corn or barley, or that they should never bo fed on soft food. But as.a change of pastures is beneficial to sheep and calves, so I would change the diet of my poultry very often, and occasionally give them soft food, but never confine them for a short time to that diet. In winter all fowls are better if they never taste soft food, i f they have plenty of meat scraps and corn; in short, the best possible heat-producing diet that can be given them. The profits from poultry depend very much upon the same rules and principles that govern the profits of the dairy.—Rural New Yorker.