CHAPTER VII 

 CARE or PENS, BANDING, NESTING MATERIAL 



CARE OF SQUAB PLANT 



It is not necessary to keep a pigeon plant clean to an extreme, 

 but each nest should be cleaned out when vacated by squabs 

 or while the squabs are still occupying the nest if they appear 

 to be exceptionally dirty. If the Eggleston double nest system 

 is used it is an easy matter to clean the nest by removing the 

 dirty nest bottom and replacing it with a fresh one. If the nest 

 contains squabs, a small handful of clean nesting material 

 should be put in first and the squabs put on top of it. 



It is not a good plan to clean the nests before squabs are two 

 or three weeks old. If they are exceptionally dirty you should 

 change your feed. Each nest room should have a thorough 

 cleaning about once a month, including the sweeping of the 

 floor and sprinkling it with air-slacked lime. If you have a 

 ground, cement or cold floor it is not a bad idea to cover the 

 floor with a mixture of lime and sawdust, mostly sawdust, and 

 just enough lime to make it clean and fresh. 



A good plan with a large plant is to do your cleaning by 

 degrees, that is, to clean so many lofts every day, so that the 

 time will not be missed and you will get to each loft every 

 month. Of course, if you have special help for that purpose to 

 come on certain days it would not be practical to have them 

 come more than once or twice a week, which naturally depends 

 upon the size of your plant and the capacity of your help. 



Some of the most practical squab breeders never have a gen- 

 eral cleaning day. They keep house on the same plan as a 

 good housekeeper by keeping everything in order, cleaning the 

 dirtiest nests as they need them and sweeping out the plant 

 most every day, and in this way they do not miss the time 

 and the plant is always clean and orderly. 



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