CHAPTER XVII. 

 DISEASES OP POULTRY. 



Poultry generally suffer from preventible ills. It is 

 almost useless, and rarely ever worth while, to treat sick 

 poultry. A chicken is hardly worth the trouble re- 

 quired to physic it, and nine out of ten die in spite of all 

 the treatment that can be given them. Poultry are 

 naturally subject to very few diseases. If kept clean, 

 not overfed, not cooped up close, kept from foul, pu- 

 trid food, supplied with clean water regularly, and have 

 abundant pure ajr in their roosting-places, they live and 

 thrive without any trouble, except in rare cases. The 

 fatal disorders which result from ill-treatment cannot 

 be cured by medicine. It is too late. The mischief has 

 been done when the first symptoms appear, and the best 

 procedure is generally to kill the diseased fowls and save 

 the rest by sanitary measures. 



DISTEMPER, ROUP, AND CHICKEN-POX. 



An article which recently appeared in a poultry jour- 

 nal is the most practical we have ever seen on these 

 subjects, and is well worth reprinting. Fowls never per- 

 spire; the waste of the system is in a large measure car- 

 ried off in the vapor of the breath, which is far more 

 rapid than is by many supposed. The heart of the 

 fowl beats 150 times per minute, which causes a rapid 

 respiration, and demands twice the amount of air in pro- 

 portion to weight. Even the bones of the wing are 

 (178) 



