MANAGEMENT OP FOWLS. 63 



should afford a convenient means of ascent, to save the birds 

 the strain of flying up, and perhaps frequent falls in conse- 

 quence of failure. A Tien-ladder is an indispensable piece of 

 furniture, though frequently absent. The nests or laying 

 places may be either wooden fixtures contiguous to the wall, 

 or the Hens may be accommodated with shallow hampers here 

 and there, out of the way of dirt, and easily reached.* The 

 fixed nests should be thoroughly whitewashed inside and out, 

 at least once a month during summer, to destroy fleas, &c. 

 The hampers may be taken down, shaken out, and completely 

 purified at intervals. 



It is as well to have the fixed laying places made not larger 

 than is sufficient to accommodate a full-sized Hen, in order to 

 prevent two or more Hens from quarrelling for the same nest. 

 I have seen excellent laying and sitting-boxes, of a convenient 

 capacity, built with brick-work, up against one or more sides 

 of the fowl-house, much in the same way as is seen in the 

 lockers in old-fashioned manorial dovecotes. Each box was 

 fitted with a loose, thin wooden bottom, to slide over the 

 bottom of stone or brickwork, and having a half-inch rim in 

 front, to keep the eggs from rolling out. The plan is a good 

 one. After each sitting, the sliding bottom of the box can be 

 taken out, scoured and scalded, and the brickwork washed and 

 white-washed, as may the wooden slide also. A great con- 

 venience, especially where a numerous and various head of 

 poultry is kept, will be found in a range of small separate 

 fowl-houses about a cubic yard or a little more in size, each 

 with its own door fastened by a button, and a latticed aperture 

 to admit air over the door. Into these, each breeding fowl, 

 with her young, can be separately driven from the coops at 

 night, and remain there without disturbance or quarrels till 

 the proper time to go abroad next day. Each of these private 



* Vide Mr. David Taggart's letter at the end of this chapter. ED. 



