ISO 



JOURNAL OP EORTIOULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



I February 5, 1874. 



thoy occasion decay by wounding the Yegetables is donbtful. If you remova 

 all your Cabba'^-e worts, burn them, mix some gan liuie with the soil, and 

 avoid gvowiug Cabbasoworts on the same plot for twelve months, you will 

 estirimte the Acari. 



Insects (TK. T. F. M. J.).— The little flies which are at the present time 

 " infesting your house so as to become a perfect nuisance " are closely allied 

 to the small common house-fly, and which, from their sma^bed condition, it 

 is almost impo3sibl6 to determine specificaUy. They are quite incapable of 

 stioging. We suppose they have been proda;:o;l from some mass of decaying 

 or putrefying vegetable matter. Has there been any extra washing of wine 

 or baer barrels in your neighbourhood, as the flies resemble the common 

 Mosillus cellarius ? — I. 0. W. 



Names of Fruits (R. IV.).— It is evidently Golden Reinette. {T. Kenmihi 

 and Co.). — We do not recognise the Apple sent. {CaroUiH.). — Your Pear is not 

 Chaumontel, and we are at a loss to say what it is. It has, however, the same 

 bitter flavour which the Chaumontel sometimes has when past its prime of 

 ripeness. Acids mixed with sugar- for some timi^have the effect of converting 

 it to a bitter principle. Charcoal powder has the power of destroying bitter 

 princiiJles ; we do not know whether it would check their formation in Pears 

 packed in it. (J. F. Smith). — 1, White Calville; "2, Dumelow's Seedling; 

 8, Norfolk Beefing ; 4, Bu-raingbam Pippin; 8, Delaware. {T. I'.).— 1, Shep- 

 herd's Fame; 3, Cornish GilUflower. 



POULTBT, BEE, AND PIGEON OHEONIOLE. 



POULTRY HOUSES AND MANAGEMENT. 



Five years ago I worried myself to provide roosting-house, 

 layiag-house, and sittiag-house without involving myself in too 

 large an outlay. From ilv to £20 was about the figure, but the 

 result was not satisfactory to me ; and my sole reason for being 

 dissatisfied was, that my fowls were not thoroughly healthy. 1 

 had many that suffered from colds ; and as draughts were not in 

 the house, I could not help fancying that I was " coddling " my 

 stock too much. Daring my second year two or three birds took 

 a fancy to high trees to roost in, and I found they were strong 

 and very healthy, laying well, and in capital condition. At the 

 end of the second year I closed the houses altogether, and this 

 is the third winter of my fowls roosting out in the trees about 

 the orchard which forms their run. They are in excellent 

 health ; and out of the whole {forty-eight in number^ I have not 

 had one sick or sorry. I have watched them most narrowly, and 

 am quite convinced that they thrive better and lay better than 

 a similar stock did when in a warm house. No one will ever 

 persuade me to use the houses again. 



As to food, fowls will do well if they are fed with maize twice 

 a-day and with house scraps at noon. But you miist limit your 

 adult birds to a certain quantity ; and I find that one penny- 

 worth per head per week, with the house scraps at mid-day, is 

 ample maize to keep them in good laying condition. I give 

 ground oats slaked with water three or four times a- week instead 

 of maize for a change ; but I do not exceed the penny per head 

 by alternating the food thus. 



I have tried custard made of new milk and eggs for chickens, 

 but now I never give anything beyond ground oats slaked with 

 water, and they are as strong as when I fed them with luxuries. 

 When a hen has hatched I at once remove her from the hedge- 

 row where she has sat to a coop without a bottom, and set it close 

 in front of another larger coop, in which I place four times a-day 

 a good allowance of the slaked ground oats. The large coop has 

 a loose board in its roof, through which the food is put, and is 

 3 feet deep. The young broods go through the bars in front of it 

 to feed, and the adult birds cannot reach it. The chicks in the 

 smaller coop soon run into the larger one, and become familiarised 

 with the larger broods ; and when a week old, if the weather is not 

 wet, I turn hen and chicks out to take their chance, taking care 

 that the supply of slaked ground oats in the coop is diligently 

 attended to. The bars are sufficiently wide to allow all the 

 young fowls of eight weeks old to creep through ; and in winter, 

 when extra food, in my opinion, is required to make up for want 

 of sun, the bars are wider, and birds older than two months can 

 creep through. 



As regards houses for laying in, I have found that hens infi- 

 nitely prefer to have their nests in the hedgerows, or under 

 faggots, sprays, &c. I used to keep the eggs of my best fowlsfor 

 setting in a tray in the dining-room, and with a wretched result 

 as to chickens. Now I never remove them from the nest, but 

 put a pencil mai'k upon them, and only remove those which are 

 sold to be eaten, and the result is five out of six eggs are fertile. 

 When a hen is broody I remove her in the evening to the nest 

 where the eggs are, cover a wire frame with sacking, so as to make 

 her new nest dark for a couple of days, and the result is five 

 chickens out of the six eggs. In tlie summer I put nine eggs, 

 in the winter six eggs under my hens. 



With respect to buying eggs for breeding, I prefer to buy a 

 pullet, and use her eggs ; for only twenty chickens out of 130 

 bought eggs, over and over again, were a result which disgusted 

 me. I know, too, that I was supplied with fresh eggs, but the 

 shaking in transit addles them. 



I never "coddle" birds, young or old; but I own to giving 

 all my young growing stock a good meal of slaked oats separate 

 from the adults, to plump them up, and I then can always pitoh 



upon a fat young bird when 1 want them for the table. As 

 to sorts or breeds, I keep, to please my eye, SUver-spangled 

 Hamburghs, and think them most beautiful. I have Brahmas, 

 pure and highly bred. (I gave 30.3. for the pullets to begin 

 breeding from). I have a grand Grey Dorking cock running with 

 them ; and thus mated, the chickens are the best layers of large 

 eggs and the best table fowls I have ever bred. I have sold them 

 at 8s. a-couple, and had 2it a-piece for the eggs all the year round. 

 My outlay from October 1st to December 31st for corn was 

 S;2 19s., my receipts ±'5 is. id. — C. C. 



EGGS IN WINTER. 



Some of yom- correspondents have sent yon "experiences " 

 of their bad luck this winter. Ours has been unprecedentedly 

 good ; and as we think we have found the best plan for ensuring 

 winter eggs, it may be worth recording. 



Eighteen pullets, hatched last March and April, began to lay 

 in December, and have given us in the five weeks past, since 

 December 21st, 374 eggs, with very little help from the older 

 fowls, the week's supply ranging from sixty-two to eighty-five at 

 a time when eggs, even in Pembrokeshire, were worth l\tl. or2rf. 

 They have no artificial food. Barley meal with skim milk or 

 broth in the morning, and whole barley at night; a mid-day feed 

 of scraps — raw mangold, or whatever comes to hand — only when 

 snow is on the ground. A good run of field, thicket, and farm- 

 yard ; a well-built hen-house, with window at each end, ventilat- 

 ing it during the day, and in winter closed at night. No arti- 

 ficial warmth. We have absolutely no sickness among the fowls 

 from year's end to year's end, and we only lose about five per 

 cent, of our chickens — that is, three or four among eighty. We 

 keep aboiit two dozen fowls. In the course of the spring we 

 shall get rid of all our two-year-old hens except eight, which we 

 keep till they have reared us our stock of chickens. From the 

 eight broods we choose twelve or fifteen of the finest pullets for 

 next winter's laying, thus keening the stock regularly sifted, 

 half " rising one," half " rising two " years old. 



The bulk of our stock is Brahmas, and our two cocks are 

 Brahmas. Besides, we have a few Game and three Silver 

 Hamburghs, whose eggs we never set. Our yard supplies our- 

 selves and our village with sittings of eggs, warranted to pro- 

 duce a large average of strong chickens — ten or twelve out of 

 thirteen. 



-ill our theory comes from your columns and Wright's 

 " Practical Poultry- Keeper ; " and our skill merely consists in 

 common care and regular cleaning, and measured and moderate 

 feeding, so that we wonder to hear so many in better climates 

 than ours complain of failure. The most forcible lesson we 

 have learnt in seven years' experience is that " favourite hens '' 

 are unprofitable — and worse, for they make poultry-keeping an 

 intolerable, distressing business. We have in former years 

 trained hens to the most familiar tamenessi; and we advise 

 anyone who cannot help making pets of their hens to give up 

 keeping poultry. The favourites are sure to grow fat and un- 

 healthy — a trouble to themselves and to their masters. " Fair 

 field and no favour " is the only rule. — A. D. C. 



REMOVING FOWLS FROM THE L.iTE BRISTOL 

 POULTRY SHOW. 

 Fe-ibixg that the letter on the above subject, signed by " A 

 Lover of Faih Plav," might lead exhibitors who did not 

 attend the Show to imagine that the Committee systematically 

 allowed birds to be taken away whenever wanted, I wish to 

 state the reason why the pen in question was removed on Satur- 

 day morning. The pullets had been fighting early in the morn- 

 ing, and when the feeders arrived one was much damaged — in 

 fact, completely scalped, and had to be removed. A gentleman 

 soon after claimed the pen on condition that he might at once 

 take them away and doctor the damaged pullet. The latter 

 being in a bad state, we were glad both for our own sake and the 

 exhibitor's to send it off. This pen, and two others sent home 

 on account of being roupy, were the only pens that left before ten 

 o'clock on Monday night, and any exhibitor who has ever been 

 at our Show will corroborate me when I say that we are very 

 strict in the observance of this rule. .\s the owner of the said 

 pen of pullets admits having been to the Show, I think he or 

 she might have inquired of the Secretary or one of the Com- 

 mittee the reason of the birds being removed — in fact, I have 

 good reasons for thinking this was done — rather than try to 

 damage our reputation by inserting such a trifling occurrence 

 in the pages of the Journal. In reference to the latter part of 

 the complaint, purchasers of birds often object to others know- 

 ing they have bought certain pens, and we never give the in- 

 formation without their consent. — E. Cambbidue. 



New Wokk on Pigeons. — Messrs. Cassell, Better, & Galpiu 

 announce a new illustrated work on Pigeons, uniform with " The 

 Illustrated Book of Poultry." The coloured plates are to be 



