164 ESSAY ON REARING TURKEYS. 



ESSAY 



ONREARING TURKEYS. 



BY ALLEN W. DODGE. 



The. increased attention excited these few years past in the 

 poultry yard, the pains that have been taken to procure new 

 and valuable breeds of fowls, and the high prices which choice 

 specimens of some varieties have recently commanded, prove 

 quite conclusively that the rearing of poultry is to occupy a 

 higher rank, than it has heretofore done, in our stock husband- 

 ry. Poultry may, indeed, be considered as holding a similar 

 relation to the other stock of the farm, that the smaller and rarer 

 fruits hold to the staple products of the orchard. But a short 

 time ago little or no attention was paid to the cultivation of 

 plums, cherries, strawberries, and other garden fruits. The 

 winter eating, and the cider apple, was all that the farmer 

 thought worthy of his care, in the way of fruit culture. But 

 with the increase of population, in our cities and large towns, 

 a demand has been created for these choicer fruits. The culti- 

 vation of them has been extended, and in the raising of such 

 fruits as cannot be brought from a distance without damaging, 

 if not wholly spoiling, the farmer, not less than the suburban 

 gardener, will find an increasing profit. 



So too, the markets, with the growth of our cities, demand 

 larger supplies of poultry ; and poultry, especially early chick- 

 ens, cannot well bear a long transportation without injury. 

 Hence, there is less competition from abroad in the sale of 

 them. They command, and, for some years past, have com- 

 manded a good price, such as is more remunerative than that 

 paid for the beef and pork raised here. Now the business of 

 poultry raising may be overdone, — the market glutted and the 

 producers out of pocket. But this is not yet the case. On 

 the contrary, the demand for eggs and poultry, as for other 

 delicacies of the table, is increasing, as the natural effect of the 



