POULTRY NOTES

Shannon News, 20 January 1925, Page 1

POULTRY NOTES

PROBLEM OF DISEASE. The Connecticut Agricultural College, ..in discussing the problem of disease, states that “there ds a general agreement among authorities that the doctoring of poultry is not to be recommended except in a case,of a few diseases such as chicken-pox, colds and cases of intestinal worms. There are two very good reasons for this belief: First, the unit of production of the individual bird is so small on the commercial plant that if a man’s time is worth anything, it is too valuable to spend treating sick chickens individually unless they are show specimens Of great individual value. Second, the cured chicken is always a menace to the health of the flock, because its identity is likely to be overlooked or forgotten, and it goes into the breeding-pen and may perpetuate through the off-spring that constitutional weakness that was one of the primary causes of its being ill. The opinion of practically all poultrymen who rear large numbers of fowls is that in a large proportion of cases of diseases the birds ought to be killed. The only treatment recommended for th e poultryman is to give treatment when it can be applied to a flock conveniently and with reasonable expectation of beneficial esults. Treat individuals only when the treatment is simple, easy, and needs to be /administered but a very few times.”