32 THE PRACTICAL POULTRY KEEPER. 



t( Sweepings" sometimes contain poisonous substances, and 

 should never be seen in a poultry-yard. 



The quality of all grain should be carefully looked after. 

 Barley should be fair malting quality, not the cheap husky 

 kind. Of oats, mixed horse-meat is useless ; only heavy 

 white oats, 40 Ib. per bushel, are good for fowls. Much 

 buckwheat offered is either old dried-up grain, or kiln-dried; 

 it is the fresh dark grain that is wanted. Of maize, the 

 small round sort is best. " Poultry mixture " should be 

 religiously avoided. It always consists of the poorest 

 samples, and prevents the birds getting any change. Give 

 one good grain sample at a time, and if possible change it 

 every week for some other. 



The midday meal of penned-up fowls should be a very 

 scanty one a mere sprinkle of grain; and even this is 

 worse than useless unless the other meals are sparingly 

 given, as directed. Table scraps should never be used for 

 this meal. More failures result in domestic poultry-keeping 

 from thus giving starchy and fat food than from any other 

 error in diet. 



The regular and substantial diet is now provided for, 

 but will not alone keep the fowls in good health and laying. 

 They are omnivorous in their natural state, and require 

 some portion of animal food. On a wide range they will 

 provide this for themselves, and in such an establishment as 

 figures at page 13, the lean meat scraps of the dinner table 

 may be quite sufficient ; but if the number kept be large, 

 with only limited accommodation, it will be necessary to 

 buy every week a few pennyworth of bullock's liver, which 

 may be boiled, chopped fine, and mixed in their food, the 

 broth being used instead of water in mixing; these little 

 tit-bits will be eagerly picked out and enjoyed. A little 

 is all that is necessary. When fowls, especially those not 

 laying at the time, are much over-fed in confinement with 



