268 THE GROUSE IN HEALTH AND IN DISEASE 



top soil can be taken off to a depth of 3 or 4 inches and then burned. 

 Even under this condition it is advisable to lime the soil. 



It is useless to remove heavily infected stock to fresh places, for it is far 



better to destroy such birds and to place healthy stock on fresh, 



healthy unpolluted grounds. All other suspected birds should be isolated, 



stock 



and careful examination made of their excrement. In the case of 

 epizootics among fowl-chicks one recent experience that I had was of a case 

 where over fifty birds died in a very short time of undoubted Coccidiosis. 

 Tracing the history of the remainder I found they had come from broods reared 

 by handsome hens obtained from an estate where, on inquiry, I found that 



there had been heavy mortality from Coccidiosis during the previous 

 Mothers or year. The mothers and foster-mothers were all carefully isolated, 

 mothers and examination made of their faeces from day to day. In a very few 



may be 



chronics, days two fine hens were discovered whose dejecta showed daily crops 

 young. of oocysts of Eimeria (Coccidium) avium, and I do not think there 

 is any doubt that these two birds had become chronics, and that their 

 excrement had fouled the large grass run, and was the source of the trouble 

 among the young birds. It may be added that washings of the grass and 

 clover in the run also yielded the oocysts of the parasite when examined 

 microscopically . 



The importance of considering the possible infection of foster-mothers in 

 pheasant-rearing is already recognised. 



Fowls and turkeys should never be reared on grounds where much mortality 

 Fowls and fr m "white diarrhoea" or "blackhead" has been known to occur, 

 maylnfect ^ tne original occupants of the land were turkeys the oocysts of 

 each other. j av j um producing "blackhead" are certain to be present in the 

 soil, and when taken up with grit, food, or drink by fowls produce the Coccidiosis 

 popularly known as " white diarrhoaa," especially in young birds. Conversely, 

 fowls can be the source of infection of turkeys. Pigeons feeding in infected 

 fowl-yards themselves become infected, and whole cotes have been wiped out 

 by Coccidiosis thus acquired. 



Where poultry are kept in wired runs it is well to provide an overhead 



wire or net covering. Not only pigeons, but sparrows, visit poultry 



and yards, etc., for food, and there take up coccidian cysts which, voided 



may spread elsewhere in their droppings, serve as new sources of infection. The 



infection. . i /] i 



damage thus done by sparrows, in their wanderings and nights, as 



