578 PHYSIOLOGY AT THE FARM. 



Another still more objectionable mode is to throw the food in 

 lumps upon the ground or road, however dirty, and to let the 

 creatures scramble for it as they best can. 



The best place for feeding ducks and geese is near a water- 

 pond, or at least there must be a supply of water near, as geese 

 cannot well swallow their food without water. 



In winter they should all be fed twice a-day namely, in 

 the morning and in the afternoon ; in summer, three times a- 

 day morning, noon, and afternoon. The afternoon meal 

 should always be in time to allow the fowls, as is their custom, 

 to go to roost before sunset. 



For fowls and turkeys, boiled potatoes in their skins, a little 

 warm, and broken to pieces with the hand at their place of 

 feeding, make excellent food. In winter, with both meals, a 

 few grains of wheat, barley, oats, or Indian-corn, are thrown 

 down along with the potatoes, and also some morsels of hard- 

 boiled oatmeal porridge. In summer the grain food is given 

 only with the noontide meal. The same course suits well with 

 the ducks. Geese thrive best on grass as pasture. In winter 

 geese feed well on turnips, and even on raw potatoes cut 

 small for them. In summer the geese at the noontide meal 

 should get the like allowance of grain as the fowls, turkeys, 

 and ducks. 



If such a course be followed, there is no occasion for any 

 special mode of fattening the poultry, and especially of cram- 

 mingthey will always be ready for the kitchen, and disease 

 among them will hardly be known. 



In winter some economical means of heating their sheds 

 artificially should be adopted. 



In a poultry stock conducted on this plan, cock-turkeys may 

 be obtained of 18 Ib. weight by Christmas, and hen-turkeys 

 of 15 Ib., geese of 12 Ib., ducks of 8 Ib., and chickens and fowls 

 quite plump and fat. 



