PHEASANT REAEIXG. 181 



go mucli farther if made into custard. When 

 six weeks old they will do well enough with- 

 out the eggs; and, managed in this way, we 

 know two children, aged eleven and nine, 

 who can rear forty or fifty pheasants without 

 any assistance. Ants' eggs are best collected 

 in a zinc bucket with a close-fitting lid, 

 and this should be filled with water for a 

 good many hours before they are given to the 

 birds, or the ants will sting them so about the 

 legs and eyes that they will be afraid to come 

 near them. In August they will find their 

 way into the corn-fields ; and, if they get good 

 picking on the stubbles, perhaps boiled pota- 

 toes and raisins are as good things as you can 

 put down to keep them near home. When 

 reared in small numbers of 150 or so, they will 

 be found to do better if put in separate lots of 

 not more than fifty together. 



Bh'ds of the same age being together the 

 smaller ones do not get robbed by the older 

 birds, and they all catch so many more insects 



