REPORT OF TEE POULTRY MANAGER 233 



SESSIONAL PAPER No. 16 



their vitality. Some may be the better of a little food; if so, a few stale bread crumbs 

 may be given. 



Second and third days. — Stale bread soaked in skimmed milk and squeezed dry, 

 or one part of finely-chopped hard-boiled egg and three parts of stale bread crumbs. 

 Feed no more than the chickens will eat up without waste. If the chicks are hearty, 

 feed every two or three hours. Continue this for a day or two, and then add granu- 

 lated oatmeal. Continue the stale bread soaked in milk and granulated oatmeal foi* 

 ten days, when finely-crushed corn may be added to the foregoing with advantage. 

 After fourteen days give whole wheat, in small quantity at first. 



As the chicks grow older, they should be given a mash composed of stale bread, 

 shorts, oatmeal, ground meat, &c. Finely-cut bone or meat will be found a great 

 incentive to growth at this stage. 



On the chickens becoming eight weeks of age, their feeds may be reduced to three 

 times per day. Care should be taken that they are generously fed the last time for the 

 day. For drink give them skimmed milk and water. When the hen-hatched chickens 

 are fully feathered, their mothers should be removed from them. The chickens will be 

 found to return to their coops as usual, where they may be allowed to remain until 

 removed to more commodious quarters in colony houses. On the incubator-hatched 

 chickens becoming too large for the brooders they should be removed to colony houses. 



MOULTING OF THE HENS IN SUMMER. 



How the hens may be made to moult during the summer months is a question 

 that is frequently asked, particularly at the beginning of the summer season. The 

 following treatment has been successful here for several years. During the early part 

 of July — after the breeding season is over — the fowls were placed on half the usual 

 rations for 15 or 20 days. The effect of this treatment was the stoppage of egg produc- 

 tion and the loosening of the old feathers. At the end of 15 or 20 days, the full rations 

 were resumed. A little linseed meal may then be added to the mash with benefit. 

 Before the beginning of operations to bring on the moult, the cock -birds were removed 

 from the breeding pens and placed in compartments by themselves. The hena were 

 then allowed to run in small fields where they could find insects, clover, grass, &c. In 

 the feeding of the fowls during moult, care should be observed that they do not become 

 too fat. The fowls are more apt to become over-fat from too generous feeding during 

 the moult than after they have recommenced laying. 



EXPEEIMENTAL WORK 'OF THE YEAR 



The close of the fiscal year ending March 31, 1908, found different pens of fowls 

 selected and mated for breeding purposes, as follows : — 



Male. Females. 

 No. 1 house, pen 1 — White Plymouth Rocks 1 16 



u a 



2 — Buff Orpingtons 1 14 



3— White Leghorns 1 16 



4 — White Leghorns 1 16 



5 — Black Minorcas 1 12 



6— White Orpingtons 1 12 



7 — Faverolles 1 12 



