Poultry Notes.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XXXXV, Issue 253, 24 November 1903, Page 4

Poultry Notes.

ABOUT GROWING CHICKEN'S. (From the Australian Hen.) Feed abundantly. Free range pays. Separate the sexes. Also the different sizes. Keep free from vermin. Provide abundant shade. Let the drinking water be pure. Give variety and see them grow. Push forward "the early pullets. Don't overcrowd the chicks at any stage. The qmarters which were large enough for 50 chicks will now he too small. Divido the flock, or provide more room, otherwise tnere will be serious trouble.

Give the older chicks anything they will eat, and plenty of it ; you will find it pays. •Greenstuff, grit, pure, cool water, abundant and varied food, cleanliness and freedom from insect pests go a long way towards rearing profitable poultry. Just see that the rings on the chicks which were banded young are not becoming so tight on the leg as to prejudicially affect their welfare. It pays to wean the chicks as early as pdssible in the summer, for they don't improve with contact with a mother that is almost sure to be, to a certain extent, lousy.

Tlie chicks would be more comfortable lin refrigerators than some of the brooders this hot weather. We never could understand how people claiming even an average amount of commonsense, could keep the lamp going full blast all day during the summer.

The Feather says : Earth is the best floor under the coops for young chicks ; cWtch nownd them so tha|t the earth will keep perfectly dry.

Take care to have a plentiful supply of green feed for the chicks right through the summer. Good sound oats are a health, bone amd muscle food that can be advantageously given the larger chick.

A good and regular supply of animal food loads to rapid growth. Perhapß the natural kind is the, test, but since all cannot have that, it devolves upon the breeder to see that it is supplied in some form or other.

Chickens differ from humans in that it is good to let the grass grow under their feet to a certain extent.

Don't leave the drinking vessels in the sun. J-iuke warm water on a hot day is neither healthful nor refreshing. Examine tha chicks occasionally for head lice ; these little pests make much havoc in a flock if they once obtain a hold.

It is as well to havp the chickens' quarters frell lime-washed_ and disinfected occasionally ; cleanliness is conducive to rapid and satisfactory growth.

Mr Jas. Stewart, Hillcrest, Berowra, says he has saved many chicks by adopting an idea he captured from an American paper. In the brood coops scattered round the orchard for the larger chicks some trouble was experienced in keeping the chicks dry in rainy weather. The introduction of a bJUard floor would attain the object, of course, but the trouble of cleaning arid the subsequent fouling caused by its soaking up the moisture from the droppings ruled it out. The new departure overcomes this ; it is simply a fake floor made of laths from one to two inches apart, and raised about three inches from the ground. This keeps the chicks dry while retaining all the benefits of an earth 'floor, at the same time; the great bulk of the droppings jgill pass between the slats, rptßttlg the matter of cleaning to nilMwjr fhe coops on to fresh ground. Mr Stewart fjft.ds that the idea works to perfection.

ABOUT EGGS. Lime wash the nests. Keep a nest egg in each. Provide nests for the very early pullets. Overfat hens lay soft shelled eggs. Double yolked eggs are no credit. Infertile ejgs are the best for market. Don't allow broodies to stay in the laying nests. Put some tobacco leaf in all the nest boxes. Vpu cannot produce lice and eggs as well. The early maturing pullet is the layer. A Chatswood (N.S.W ) resident has shown us an egg laid by a full grown hen, weighing just'irt gi'ains —under one drachm.