136 DOMESTIC ANIMALS. [Chap. I. 



s 



mixing the black wild vaVich' with a white or party-colored one imported 

 from the other side of tlie Atlantic. We prefer the pure black breed, for it 

 gives us the largest and hardiest birds, and we think, also, the handsomest. 

 The pure whiie turkey, it is true, is quite ornamental, but it is not as hardy 

 a sort as the black. As for yellow or party-colored turkeys, we woidd not 

 have them on a i)lacu a moment longer than necessary to fiitten, kill, and 

 eat them. 



Tiio wild hen turkey is wild in the extreme, while the tame one is so do- 

 mestic that you may rob her secret nest every day of the new-laid egg, yet 

 she will return again and .again until she has finished her season, and then 

 commence her period of incubation upon the empty nest. Now, if you have 

 a nest i)repared under cover, with the eggs in it, you may bring home the 

 hen and put her gently upon her eggs, and she will manifest great satisfac- 

 tion, and after carefully examining and placing them all right, will sit upon 

 them as though the nest was all her own. Thirteen eggs are enough for an 

 ordinary-sized turkey, and if she has a good nest she will cover that number, 

 so as to give all a fair chance to hatch. It is not necessary to turn the eggs, 

 as some persons do — the hen attends to that — nor look at them until about 

 the time the four weeks are up, when it will be well to remove the chicks as 

 tiicv come out, or else take out all the shells and rotten eggs, if there are 

 any, to give the chicks room, for they generally are better off in a good nest 

 than out of it. ISluit the hen in a coop, where the chicks can bask in the 

 sun, and not get in the wet grass. You need not feed much the first day ; a 

 few bread crun»l)s will answer. Then give all they will eat of hard-boiled 

 egg, chopped tine ; chopped meat, fat and lean ; curds, boiled rice or hom- 

 iu}', with cress, lettuce, and green onions. Don't stuff them with pepper- 

 corns. The idea that that is necessary is all stuff". Liver, boiled and clioi)ped 

 up, is good food ; so is barley meal and suet. Melt the suet and pour over 

 the meal and mix, and then crumb up when cold. Mauy green things may 

 be chopped up and mixed with milk and water and meal. Don't try to cut 

 up feed very tine. The young turkeys, you will find, can swallow big 

 lumps. After ten days you may let the hen run, if the w^eather is fine. In 

 bad weather they are apt to take cold, and cramp, and die. Care and high 

 feeding are all that are needed to raise turkeys. 



"\Vc knew a woman in Louisiana who raised fifteen hundred out of sixteen 

 hundred hatched. She had an old negro woman and a boy to attend to the 

 Avants of the turkeys, and in wot, chilly weather the young broods were all 

 gathered into a log-cabin, warmed b}' a generous wood tire. 



"We have also before us another example of successful turkey raising by a 

 woman, that is worthy of attention by some other farmers' wives, who may 

 go and do likewise. Lydia Eldridge, of Andover, Mass., writes her expe- 

 rience in raising turkeys, under date of Dec. 25, 1858 : 



"Last spring my husband ]iurchascd a farm in this town, and I obtalneil 

 one turkey, and she laid 2-t eggs, hatched them all out at one litter, and I 

 raised them all. Yesterday we dressed the last of them. The united weight 



