40 



CANARIES, HYBRIDS, AND BRITISH BIRDS 



and connected through the wall to the 

 radiator ; as it is self-contained, an ex- 

 perienced fitter is not required to fix it. 

 The boilers, tanks, and boiler cases are 

 made of stout, hard copper throughout, 

 which does not rust and will wear for years. 

 The tubes are of heavy welded iron, and 

 the fittings of best n.allcable iron. The 



One of the latest heating apparatus by 

 which a bird-room may be kept at a genial 

 temperature is an electric stove 

 patented by Messrs. Rorke Bros., 

 of Barnes. London, a diagram 

 of which is shown on this page. Messrs. 

 Rorke's description of it is as follows : 

 " A is the electric stove ; no lamps are 



Electric 

 Stoves. 



MESSRS. RORKE'S ELECTRIC STOVE. 



burners are made of brass, and are adajited 

 for atmosplieric flames and cannot rust." 



These heaters can be obtained in any 

 size and constructed to suit any special 

 place, either vertical or horizontal, or to 

 fit any angle. No. 1 size, suitable for any 

 ordinary room, has a length over all of 

 fi ft. by 1 ft. G in. by 7 in., and to keep 

 the rf)om at a tcinjieraturc of say 00' or 

 65° will consume about 4 cubic feet of gas 

 per hour. This would involve a cost of 

 Id. for 8 hours with gas at 2s. lid. per 

 1,000, which compares favourably with any 

 other means of heating. We use one of 

 these apparatus in our own bird-room 

 at the commencement of the breeding 

 season, when the nights are cold, and 

 have found it a most efiicient means of 

 maintaining a general temperature at a 

 nominal cost. 



required in this, as llie heat is produced 

 by the passage of electricity through wires ; 

 it is therefore non-luminous. The elec- 

 tricity for the stove is taken from any 

 source of supply at any ordinary voltage. 

 One of the supply wires is broken at the 

 automatic switch 1), with the result that 

 when the automatic switch is ' on ' the 

 electric stove is ' on,' and when the switch 

 is ' o(T ' the stove is ' ofi'.' The mo\cments 

 of the switch 1) arc governed by the maxi- 

 mum and minimum thermometer B. This 

 thermometer is of the ordinary type, in 

 which the mercury ri.ses in one limb, say 

 the right, for a rise of temperature and for 

 a fall of temperature it rises in the left 

 limb : as a con.sequence the two contacts 

 (one on the right and the other on the 

 left) shown in the illu.stration (which enter 

 into the tube by thin platinum wires) are 



