92 PRACTICAL PHEASANT REARING. 



very well with this manufacture for some years, that it 

 has a nice colour and scent, and is attractive to the 

 eye, as well as successful with the birds ; and that if 

 any other rearers have a fancy to use the same food 

 that we do, he (my manager) has my free permission to 

 turn a few shillings by the supply of it. 



When mixed together as described, the food is placed 

 in an open flat tin, and the feeder starts off on his 

 rounds, working with one hand the food in his tin as 

 he passes between the coops. This becomes a matter 

 of habit, and the food, if properly mixed, may easily, 

 as he passes along, be worked up into the proper size 

 of pellets, although to mix up a tin of food properly is 

 really no easy matter. I cannot do it myself, and, on 

 cross-examination of my keeper, he admitted to me the 

 other day that he has only once had under him a man 

 who never failed in mixing his food, and that one got 

 drunk and had to be discharged. 



All food should be scattered in front of the coop, 

 gradually leading up to the bough, in which, after a 

 time, the young birds should be continually fed, the 

 exercise of searching for and picking out the food 

 from among the birchen leaves and twigs proving a 

 most wholesome exercise for the youngsters. 



If the weather be damp, mix your food drier, i.e., 

 add more meal, and pursue the reverse plan in very 

 fine weather ; all this comes by practice. After the 

 poults are five or six days old they will delight in 

 searching for their dinner under the boughs; but just at 



