128 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



CARE OF POULTRY. 



It has been customary with chairmen of this Committee 

 to make a few suggestions from year to year in regard to the 

 attention and care necessary for poultry. The ground has 

 been so well covered, that it is hardly possible to say any 

 thing new on the subject. 



There are two vital points which we would dwell upon 

 for a moment. First, cleanliness, in order to insure complete 

 immunity from lice, which can only be secured by the fre- 

 quent use of Avhitewash, sulphur, and carbolic acid, or kero- 

 sene-oil upon the roosts, together with frequent cleansing of 

 the floor, and occasionally fresh earth or sand ; and, second, 

 the importance of plenty of grass or green vegetable matter. 



If these are adopted as of prime necessity, there will be 

 little difficulty in raising poultry successfully. Roup and 

 other diseases will become almost annihilated. From care- 

 ful observation of many j^ears, the necessity of grass seems 

 to be greatly underrated. How often do we see thirty or 

 forty fowls shut up during the summer months till they be- 

 come sickly, when a daily supply of grass would keep them 

 healthy ! 



The writer had a flock of forty to fifty Plymouth-Rocks 

 in his barnyard during the summer months. They were 

 supplied with fresh cut grass nearly every day. They would 

 sometimes consume a two-bushel basket full twice in a 

 single day. We lost only one fowl by disease during the 

 whole season, and this was a case of apoplexy. ' How many 

 persons who shut up their fowls in contracted quarters pro- 

 vide them with any thing like this amount of grass ? yet it 

 is highly important. 



As a cheap and easy method of securing good grass runs, 

 we would recommend the use of seine-netting for temporary 

 enclosures. It can be bought second-hand as low as two 

 cents per pound ; but perhaps the cheapest in the end would 

 be the new tarred netting. This is used quite extensively 

 by farmers in Westport, living not far from the seashore, and. 

 answers the purpose of cheap fencing admirably. 



In many cases the kitchen-garden could be surrounded by 

 this netting ten feet high, which would give the poultry free 

 range over the farm. The nearer we can follow nature in 



