CARE OF CANARIES.

Waikato Times, Volume XXVIII, Issue 2283, 26 February 1887, Page 2 (Supplement)

CARE OF CANARIES.

The majority of people keep their canaries too warm. The Canary Islauds may be a trifle warmer than Britain, but the canary bird is not a salamander for all that. I gave a friend of mine—-who has a large family and a smoking husband —a pair of healthy and happy young birds. She hung their cage close up to the sitting room ceiling, and the breath | of six pairs of lungs, the heat of lamps and the smoke of the good man's after supper pipe, killed the little sufferers in i five days. I wonder that they lived 24 hours. Canaries are often famished for fresh, cool water. You will see bits of sugar aud sponge cake, or biscuit and apple, tucked all about the wires, while the drinking cup will be empty, or filled with green water or trash, which no bird can touch. If the abused bird could speak he would say that he would like a little less of grocery store about him, and a good square drink of clean water now and then. A sufficiently large bath dish is very necessary, giving room for the little wings to spread themselves. How would we human birds enjoy taking a bath in a narrow wash boiler ? A canary seldom has room enough, and water enough for a thorough good bath. A canary is not an epicure. He doesn't care for a dinner of eleven courses. All he wants is clean, fresh seeds, and some cuttle fish bone, with, in winter a bit of apple or crisp cabbage, and in summer a relish of luttece or chickweed. Mother bird's, of course need a little hard boiled egg and soaked biscuit every day to help the business of baby feeding, and young birds should have soaked bread or biscuit, and their seeds crushed until their little bills become strong enough to do their cracking. All other canaries are healthier and happier for a pure seed and fresh water diet, with the aforementioned relish of fruit or lettuce. Clean sand should be spread on the floor of the cage every day. Birds are social in their tastes, and they like to be talked to, aud visited with, aud with little trouble they will soon learn to respond to their names, and to do many cunning tricks.—American Agriculturist.