56 THE PRACTICAL POULTRY KEEPER. 



run can be made much more extensive than here shown. 

 These wire runs are also largely sold in lengths as desired. 

 They need moving every day or two to clean ground. 



An enclosed run for chicken-rearing can generally be 

 protected from cats by a sufficiently high wire fence, with 

 no top rail. The wire must, however, be carried, or at 

 least a narrower strip of it, up above the top, on the inside, 

 of any wall or inner edge of a roof or fence which cats can 

 walk along. We always found this effectual except in one 

 case, and that cat mysteriously disappeared ! 



With regard to feeding, if the question be asked, " What 

 is the best soft food for chickens, irrespective of price ? " the 

 answer must decidedly be " Oatmeal." After the first meal 

 of bread-and-milk and egg no food is equal to it, if coarsely 

 ground, mixed with a little bread-crumb and finely-cut fresh 

 grass, and only moistened so much as to remain crumbly. 

 The price of oatmeal is, however, so high as to forbid its use 

 in general, except for valuable broods ; but we should still 

 advise it for the first week, in order to lay a good foundation. 

 It may be moistened either with water or milk, but in the 

 latter case only sufficient must be mixed for each feeding, as 

 it will turn sour within an hour in the sun, and in that 

 condition is very injurious to the chickens. Spratt's well- 

 known food, or any other similar biscuit meal, is also most 

 excellent for rearing chickens upon, but still better mixed 

 and scalded with oatmeal. 



We do not like giving egg more than one day ; to do so 

 often causes constipation, and this (by reaction) diarrhoea. 

 But a little cooked meat, minced fine, should be given once 

 a day till the chicks are about three to four weeks old. The 

 cost of this will be inappreciable, as a piece the size of a good 

 walnut is sufficient for a whole brood ; and the chickens will 

 have more constitution and fledge better than if no animal 

 food is supplied, 



