Autumn Work

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 323, 7 April 1928, Page 24

Autumn Work

MUCH work is necessary at This season of the year on the poultry plant and buildings. It is a tune ot cleaning up in readiness for the winter, and sretring the birds ‘ in their new places. The pullets have already p -n separated from the cockerels, and if the;- a ; tc f’, a the right time tvill now be laying, these bira? moved, to their permanent quarters before thei e=.in .e lay. for if you wait until they have commenced la., mg will stop for a time on account of the change. ew a “ - then a poultryman who wants to get ail the growth before ’the birds mature, will change the pulle*s from place to place thus putting off the egg production.

FIRST of all. tie winter quarters should be thorough!;" renovated. The entire building should be gone over. Take out all the moveable fixtures and give them a good spraying with some good disinfectant, and then give a good coat of whitewash. There are several different preparations which may be used in painting the roosts and interior fixtures that will keep the lice and mites away from the building. A preparation containing a good percentage of A.M-A. disinfectant mixed with limewash will prove a powerful cleanser. The mites especially cannot stand the fumes of this preparation, and will soon make their way from the premises.

Clean out all the old straw and a few inches of the earth, if you have an earth floor in the house. Fresh soil should then be placed in the building, and on top of this a quantity of oaten or wheaten straw. The latter will brighten up the feathers of dirty plumaged birds in a short time. It is a wise plan to whitewash the interior of the poultry-house. It will have a fresh, clean smell, and the birds will enjoy the light airy surroundings. LOOK TO THE NESTS

Now something about the nests. Do you appreciate the fact that nests attached to the building are simply an invitation to lice to come in? Well, they are. Have your nests either on legs or hung by hooks to the wall in such a way that the back of the nest does not touch the side of the house. Have you ever removed a nest that has been nailed to the side of the building, to find the back of it covered with red mites? Well, that is the result of an attached nest. If you can have the nests so arranged that yon can remove them once a week for cleaning and spraying, you will not have this trouble. Dice and mites will come unless you keep up a warfare ; against them. Th% only thing to do is to have the fixture so that you can I take them out once in a while for i cleaning. With a good hand-sprayer ; and a whitewash brush you can fight the enemy in good style. It pays ; to have those things, and to keep ! up the war agdinst the enemy, even | when you cannot see them. You : may think that there are no lice, and that everything is going along ser- j enely, but all of a sudden the egg pro- j duction shuts off and the hens act as 1 though something were the matter j with them. You examine a hen and then you begin to fight. But it is so much easier to fight them when there are but few than when they have a foothold. DUST BATHS Y'ou will need to lay in a supply of material for dust baths. The writer does not, personally, favour dust, for the reason that it is pretty dirty stuff when you stop to think of it. There is better material than this, and that is good, dry earth, .with some line ash siftings in it. You can put some sulphur in this, and it will make an acceptable dust bath. If the floor of your poultry house is of earth, you will not need to have this. Possibly the earth is of loam, and hence stays moist to quite an extent; if so, you have an excellent dusting place for fowls. It is not that they prefer the dry earth for a dust bath, hut they take it because they can get nothing else. Have you ever noticed hens w r hen they have their freedom? They

will dust in the moist earth in Inference to that which is so very dry. Thev like to get the cool, earth about them and seem to take keen delieht in the process. The moist earth does not take the oil irom the feathers nor make the plumage dry Ind harsh. However, you must provide some kind of a dust bath tor the winter, so make preparations tor it now. WINTER GREEN FEED The time to plan for the winter supply of green food is at hand. Make provision for all the green crops possible, and if these fail you. arrange to feed sprouted eats. At this time oi the year it is well to clean up your brooders and other small coops. Do not put them away or leave them in a state of unclealiness to remain so throughout the winter. They should be cleaned and disinfected. If you can whitewash them do so. and you will have coops ready for business when spring comes and you will need them again. Now, just a word about this cleaning process. Here on our plant we are so particular about this that we even scrape the. bottoms of the brooders and other small coops with a putty knife. We get right down to the board floor, and do not leave a particle of filth to accumulate anywhere. When this is done every part of the interior is gone over with a solution for disinfecting and for keeping away lice and mites. While this process is gone through with at frequent intervals there is a general cleaning in the autumn, making the coops ready for the spring work. There are good prospects ahead for the poultryman, and if he would enjoy the best of prosperity he should do all the work on the plant when it is time to do it. Never put off the work from day to day. “Do it now/’ should be the motto on every poultry plant. WARNING Do not blame anyone but yourself when disease breaks out in your flock this autumn if you are using old coops for conditioning birds without thoroughly disinfecting them. It is not unlikely you will put your choicest male—the one you count on for the cup—in a coop yon used last season as a hospital for roupy fowls. Such coops are sure to be full of germs, aDd a menace to the flock. The poultryman who does not appreciate the necessity of care in just such matters is courting failure. If you cannot buy new coops, clean and paint up the old ones.