White Comb in Fowls.

Te Aroha News, Volume VII, Issue 445, 12 February 1890, Page 3

White Comb in Fowls.

The following from the columns of a con temporary will no doubt be found useful by many of our readers : A disease which we infer is but vaguely understood, comes among a flock of fowls which do not have the best of care and seems to cause tho breeder a great deal of anxiety as to what it is and how it may be cured." This trouble is a disease of the comb. White comb attacks chiefly Cochins, but may attack any fowls kept in small and unhealthy localities, and deprived of fresh vegetables. The disease consists of a whitish scurf, sometimes described as a dust which begins at the bottom of the comb, then covers the whole, then attacks the wattles, and then the skin of the neck. The feathers die off and leave the bare quills, or these may drop off. The hen may die. Some observers think it contagious. Its real nature is a result of an animal growth , which fact might explain the contagion. The treatment must begin with putting the hen under proper circumstances and correcting the error in diet. Put sulphur and tar ointment on the place. Turmeric is said by Wright to be a specific ; he uses it in an ointment of cocoanut oil one ounce, and powdered turmeric onequarter of an ounce. If lard is used, instead of cocoanut oil, the fancier should take care to mix it fresh for every application, and clean carefully the parts occasionaUy. , . , , Internally, after having given a dose ot castor oil, give a teaspoonful of powdered sulphur in the food daily for ten days. This is cheaper and more convenient than compound calomel pills recommended by some in five-grain doses, every other night for a week. The homeopaths give sulphur first, and follow with Staphisagria, three times a day. The feathers will reappear next moulting time. A condition called scurvy shin sometimes appears here, from the same cause, with the same treatment, and may possibly be essentially the same thing.