MANAGEMENT OF SITTERS. 129 



cold weather, from three to five minutes will do, and in 

 medium weather, anywhere from ten minutes to thirty, 

 forty-five or sixty minutes. Whenever the attendant is 

 examining nests, or doing other work in the houses for 

 sitters, he should operate the hammers and feed shelves 

 as directed under the head of Houses for Sitters, Chap- 

 ter VIII. The sitters will do much running besides, on 

 their own account. The layers, which are in the same 

 runways and buildings occupied by the sitters, feed at 

 the same time as the latter, and the layers have numer- 

 ous opportunities to feed, while each batch of sitters has 

 one opportunity only. This is all right, for the sitters 

 should be rather sparingly fed, in order to keep them 

 keen and eager, so that they may leave their nests 

 promptly at feeding time and not have to be removed by 

 hand. Whenever the feed shelves are operated, there 

 should be only the very smallest possible quantity of 

 grain jarred down, consisting of millet or very fine 

 cracked corn. The object is to confirm the habit, which 

 all the birds will have, of running back and forth to see 

 what is good at the other terminus of the yards between 

 whiles, when the attendant is not present. 



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