Pheasants Diseases. 



43 



twice a day. No doubt, a large number of the birds will die, 

 but some will recover and grow into fine strong pheasants. 

 When the attack is severe and general, there can be nothing 

 lost by endeavouring to save a few from this scourge. 



Scrofula is a disease which occasionally overtakes the 

 stock of those preservers who seek to rear the young birds 

 on tainted unhealthy ground, trust to unhealthy birds as 

 parent-stock or indulge in the process of in-breeding to 

 an unwarranted extent, that is, fail to introduce at the 

 necessary intervals the fresh blood amongst their stock 

 which we have already declared to be indispensable to the 

 preserver of pheasants in large quantities. It generally 

 takes the form of tubercles in the liver, but in some instances 

 all the well-known symptoms which characterise scrofula in 

 fowls have been developed. The only way to obviate an 

 outbreak of this malady is not to neglect the required intro- 

 duction of fresh blood amongst the stock, and to be careful 

 that the rearing grounds are not tainted. 



Young chicks often suffer from vent binding, and if 

 careful attention is not given them, the vent feathers pro- 

 perly cut off, and the parts treated with sweet oil, a good 

 deal of mortality will ensue. One must always have an eye 

 for this, and if one or two are discovered to be affected, 

 the others should be examined, as the causes are sure to be 

 present. 



We now come to the consideration of that direful malady 

 known as gapes, which, in truth, is the great bane of pheasant 

 rearing by hand. With the nature of the disease everyone is 

 acquainted ; and there is no necessity to enter upon an 

 elaborate description. It may be as well, however, to state 



