MONEY IN POULTRY.

Southern Cross, Volume 2, Issue 11, 16 June 1894, Page 6

MONEY IN POULTRY.

Mr Bew, one of the sub-commis-sioners attached to the Royal Commission upon Agriculture, has been busy in Sussex making enquiries into poultry farming. In no other part of England As this branch of farming carried on to such an extent or with such success. Years since, before the railways were laid, the poultry farthers of the Heathfield district sent ■van-loads of chickens to the London markets. The opening of the railways, however, afforded a stimulus to the trade,, and the amount of business done now is probably four times that •of ‘4O or 50 years agb. It is said that 70,000 live chickens are imported from Ireland and detrained at Heathfield Station in the course of the year, but these .do not represent a tenth of the chickens obtained from all sources. On an average 29 tons of chickens — ■dead, plucked, and fully prepared for market —are despatched from Heathfield Station in a week—the largest quantities being sent on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays —and averaging the weight at 41b. per chicken, which is considered fair, a very simple calculation will show that the number of chickens amounts to very little short of a million a year. An idea of the magnitude of the trade may also be formed when it is said that the money received into the district immediately round Heathfield Station for dead poultry is estimated to total up to £140,000 a year.