HEALTHY, VIGOROUS BIRDS. 



237 



FIG. 126. TRIP GONG 

 BELL. 



are not suffering a whit more than all the other organs. 

 The troublesome symptom of clogging near the vent is 

 almost invariably caused by lack of exercise, but any- 

 thing else that debilitates will cause 

 it, and it is not necessarily an ac- 

 companiment of diarrhoea, dysen- 

 tery, or any other specially diseased 

 state of the bowels, or of abnormal 

 or vitiated droppings. 



These last may be in fully as nor- 

 mal a condition as any of the other 

 waste products or various secretions 

 of the animal economy. The 

 feathers begin to be clogged, in the 

 first place, by the thin matter that 

 is voided last, the muscles concerned 

 becoming tired toward the close of 

 the orgasm. A powerful muscular action is necessary, 

 to throw aside the numerous feathers surrounding the 

 vent and to discharge the thin matter 

 with sufficient force to prevent any drib- 

 bling or soiling of the surrounding parts. 

 The chick, debilitated in every muscular 

 tissue by unnatural confinement, has not 

 the strength to prevent the leakage of a 

 drop or two, which, adhering to the 

 feathers, forms the nucleus of an un- 

 sightly deposit, which increases witli 

 every evacuation. The vent itself is not 

 clogged. The deposit is outside the pas- 

 sage, not in it. The poultry keeper is apt 

 to try a change of feed, thinking that the 

 trouble consists in bad digestion, or he 

 finds fault with the brooder and changes from bot- 

 tom heat to top heat, or vice versa. But the main 

 cause is lack of exercise, and no style of brooder or 



FTG. 127. WIRE 

 FOR GONGS. 



