Partridges Breeding and Rearing. 85 



observant farmer always know where the nids are. We 

 have also noticed that a good many others know these things 

 pretty well, too. Consequently, a daily round to collect from 

 all unset nests the eggs in excess of ten or fifteen, according 

 to the season, will be an easy matter, and result in providing 

 a good store of eggs for setting under hens. The best hens 

 are certainly not bantams, but the same type as hatch out 

 the pheasant eggs. From fifteen to nineteen eggs may be 

 put under one hen, and we think the medium, seventeen, 

 the best number. The hens are best set in a hatching 

 house, if there is room ; if not, in any spot which offers 

 some of the advantages of one. The treatment up to 

 hatching time is the same as with pheasants, but the sub- 

 sequent course of operations varies somewhat. It is highly 

 important that the eggs should be thoroughly aired every 

 day, and we are inclined to think a sprinkling of tepid water 

 on the eighteenth and following days of incubation proves 

 worth the trouble entailed. We doubt if they would stand 

 artificial incubation ; the chicks would certainly die in the 

 shell in considerable numbers. It is a very common practice 

 to utilise chicks, hatched out under fowls, for making up field- 

 reared broods, which are small in numbers, to the limits 

 of a large covey ; but this is a very poor way of working 

 off hand-bred birds, for the reasons already mentioned. 



As soon as hatched the young partridges are placed in 

 the rearing coops, and treated in the same way as pheasants, 

 with the exception that their food must partake of an 

 insectile form more largely. For the first few days they 

 should receive only the eggs of the small ant, but if this 

 be really unobtainable, a substitute may be found in the 



