588 



THE AMERICAN FARMER. 



and the other is too pungent and penetrating, until they are older, and tougher-skinned. 

 Now, sponge the roosts once in a week or fortnight with kerosene, or spirits of turpentine. 

 Do this in the day time. It will thus dry off or evaporate mostly by nightfall. The fumes 

 remain, however, and these are death to the parasites, if any are about. Next, dust the 

 laying-nests and the sitting-coops, with the sulphur. Place under the straw where hens sit 

 dry tobacco leaves, if convenient. And upon the bottom and sides of nest-boxes rub the 

 kerosene, occasionally. 



Figs. 1 and 2 represent the mammoth body insects (largely magnified), that burrow 

 among the down of geese and upon the thick under-plumage of the peacock. Fig. 3 

 represents the duck-louse, an insect that seeks shelter on the soft downy feathers of the duck. 



FIG. 1. 



FIG. 2. FIG. 3. 



POULTRY VERMIN. 



FIG. 4. 



FIG. 5. 



They are not usually very troublesome to the old duck except when confined in close 

 quarters, and especially when sitting. They are a rapacious little insect, and the ducklings 

 will be liable to become infested with them unless the mother has been cleansed before 

 leaving her nest with her young flock. Figs. 4 and 5 illustrate the lice most commonly seen 

 upon hens and chicks. These are but a few of the many species of parasites that infest 

 poultry, and. which may be exterminated by proper care. Among the varieties of parasites 

 that breeders have found excessively troublesome, none have proved more difficult to destroy 

 or get rid of, when once they obtain possession of the fowl premises or get a hold on their 

 bodies, than the small red louse (or &quot;red spider,&quot; as some call it, being not unlike the green 

 house aphis), which infests many localities. This kind of vermin is not generally common, 

 but they are very annoying, and destructive as well, if they are suffered to accumulate. 



Sulphur alone dusted upon fowls will not destroy this &quot; red spider.&quot; But a thorough 

 fumigation of the house they infest, by closing the building tightly and burning a few pounds 

 of resin and sulphur together inside, will &quot;clean them out.&quot; Carbolic powder rubbed 

 through the fowls feathers, and the washing of your roosts with kerosene two or three times 

 will finish them effectually, if this be faithfully done. In the dust-boxes, where the fowls 

 enjoy their daily roll, place finely sifted leached ashes, and a pound or two of the powdered 

 sulphur mixed. Fumigate your houses twice or thrice in a season, by burning a pot of crude 

 brimstone and rosin inside (when the fowls are absent, and it is tightly closed up), and whatever 



