Live Stock, Poultry Geefe Fattening of Pigeons. 7.57 



thers of their breads and backs fliould be gently and carefully plucked : care muft 

 betaken not to pull or interrupt their down or pen feathers. 



The quills mould be pulled five out of a wing. They will bear pulling in thir 

 teen or fourteen weeks again, or twice in a year : the feathers three times a year, of 

 the old geefe and ganders,, feven weeks from each pulling. Tne young gcefe may 

 be pulled once at thirteen or fourteen weeks old, but not quilled, being hatched irr 

 March. But when late in hatching.the brood gecfe mould not be plucked fo foon 

 as April, but the month after. When well fed with barley and oats, they thrive 

 and do better, and their feathers grow fafterand are better in quality than where 

 it is omitted. They muftconftantly have plenty of grafs and water.* 



In many parts of this fenny diftrict van: advantage is made by the frequent 

 plucking of the geefe. At Pinchbeck it is the practice to pluck them five times 

 in the year, as at Lady- day, Midfummer, Lammas, Michaelmas, and Martinmas. 

 The feathers of a dead goofe are worth 6d. three giving a pound. But plucking 

 alive does not yield more than 3d. a head per annum. Some wing them only every 

 quarter, taking ten feathers from each goofe, which fell at 55. a thoufand. Plucked 

 geefe pay in feathers is. a head in Wild more Fen.-j- 



In the fatteni ng of green geefe, care mould be taken that a little green food be 

 given them along with the oats or other grain that may be employed for the pur- 

 pofe when they are put up, and that they be well fupplied with water and fand. A 

 fortnight or three weeks is long enough for this purpofe, if they be well and regularly 

 fed ; but, in the fattening of the older geefe, there will not be any neceflity for 

 the green food. The place in which they are confined with this view fliould 

 neither be too light, nor too public in its fituation, as they do not feed fo well 

 where thefe points are not attended to. They fhould likewife be at a diftance, fo 

 as to be out of the hearing of the old or ftore-geefe. 



Befides the benefits that may be derived from geefe in the feathers and the birds 

 as food, it feerns not improbable but that they might be made to produce a confr- 

 derable advantage in the way of manure, if managed under a fyitem of conftant 

 littering with draw, fern, or fome other fubftance of the fame kind, as from the 

 great quantity of grafs they confume the difcharge in the night is very confider- 

 able. 



Pigeons* Though pigeon-houfes are common on many farms, it is in very few 



* Annals of Agriculture, vol. XV. 



t Young s Agricultural Report of Lincolnshire* 



