196 Popular Science Monthly 



A Fowl and its Feathers Are Soon Riding a Moose in the Waters of 



Rainy Lake 



Parted— With This Machine 



IT was 0. G. Rieske's wife who led him 

 to invent a mechanical chicken picker. 

 She chased him out of their Buffalo home 

 one day for attempting to pick a wild 



fowl all over her nice, 



clean kitchen floor ! 



Now O. G. can pick 

 his feathered proper- 

 ties in peace and se- 

 curity. For the ma- 

 chine he has invented 

 leaves an ordinary fowl 

 absolutely naked in 

 less than five minutes. 

 Moreover no feathers 

 are scattered. 



A small electric mo- 

 tor turns a suction 

 fan, and also a roller 

 contained within the 

 instrument itself, the 

 power being trans- 

 mitted by means of a 

 flexible cable. The 

 roller is hollow and 

 its outer surface is 

 pierced by a number 

 of slits which permit 

 the incoming blast 

 produced by the fan 

 to pass freely through it. 



An electric motor furnishes the 

 power by which the fowl is picked 



The top of the 

 instrument is hooded and attached to this 

 hood is a little rubber roller which rests 

 firmly against the surface of the larger 

 drum-like wheel. The feathers of the 

 fowl, sucked up against the two rollers, 

 are plucked by having to 

 squeeze between the rollers, 

 after which they are blown 

 to a tank. A thumb con- 

 tact permits the hood to 

 be moved around on its 

 axis, and thus the relative 

 positions of the two rollers 

 are adjusted according to 

 the needs of each case. 

 The smallest wild fowl or 

 the biggest turkey may be 

 plucked with equal ease. A 

 fowl can readily be picked 

 in the dry state, but ordi- 

 narily it is scalded. This 

 device is very u.seful in 

 hotels and restaurants. 



ON Rainy Lake, Ontario, the center of 

 a virgin land where game abounds 



at all seasons, moose frequently swim 



across the arm of the lake. 



After watching 

 their chance and tim- 

 ing the chase when 

 one of the animals 

 was about the middle 

 of the lake, some hunt- 

 ers cut it off by strik- 

 ing directly across 

 from a point. 



Paddling very fast 

 in their canoe, they 

 came alongside the 

 animal and the man 

 in the bow of the boat 

 let himself from the 

 canoe onto the ani- 

 mal's back. This in 

 itself is a very diffi- 

 cult feat, as any one 

 who has ever handled 

 a tricky canoe can 

 testify. Balancing 

 himself on the ani- 

 mal's back, he sud- 

 denly let go and threw 

 himself forward, 

 precarious position by 



maintaining his 

 grasping two of the points of the strong 

 branching antlers. Thus he performed 

 the very unusual exploit of making the 

 lordly moose ignominiously carry his 

 would-be slayer to shore. 



This hunter performed the feat of jumping from the 

 bow of the canoe on to the moose's back in mid-stream 



