88 PIGEON RAISING 



breeders, or birds that are inferior parents, to 

 raise. I have also given them half-grown 

 squabs to feed after I had sold off their par- 

 ents, or young squabs that were being raised 

 for breeders that were slow about learning to 

 eat. 



Watch for the female nursery maid to retire 

 to her nest to try to lay. After a few hours, or, 

 perhaps, the next day, cautiously slip in a 

 freshly laid egg of some other pigeon and a 

 day or two later slip in another. I have even 

 placed two at once ond the foster-mother did 

 not appear to know the difference. She may 

 fly off the nest each time, but as soon as you are 

 gone she will return and there will be great re- 

 joicing in the little household at finding the egg. 

 Like childless human beings, these nursery 

 maids are always glad to take young squabs to 

 feed or eggs to hatch, and, although they are 

 incapable of reproducing themselves, the pig- 

 eon milk forms in their crops for other pigeons' 

 squabs. By taking one or two pairs of eggs a 

 year from good breeders you obtain more 

 squabs without giving the breeders the exhaus- 

 tive work of raising and feeding. My nursery 

 maids were a most successful part of my pigeon 

 plant. I raised hundreds of extra squabs in 

 this way, and sometimes squabs that would oth- 



