REARING AND FEEDING OF ANIMALS. 4Q9 



outside shutter. This description, it will be remembered, ap- 

 plies more particularly to a house of the following dimensions 

 twelve feet in length, ten in width, and the same in height. 



Fig. 38. 



Mr. LAWRENCK, who wrote a volume on the Treatment of Poultry, under 

 the assumed name of Mowbroii, makes the following observations on the con- 

 struction of poultry-houses. A space thirty by fifty feet may be made choice 

 of for the buildings and yards; the building maybe ranged along the north 

 side, and the three other sides enclosed with a trellis or slatted, or wire fence, 

 from six to eight feet in height, and subdivided with similar fences, according 

 to the number of apartments. The hen-house (a fig. 37) and turkey-house () 

 may have the roosts (c, c) in part over the low houses for ducks (</) and geese, 

 (/, g, A) and besides these there may be other apartments for hatching, or for 

 newly hatched broods, for fattening, to serve as an hospital, or for retain itur, 

 boiling,and otherwise preparing food, killing poultry and other purposes. A Hue 

 may pass through the whole for moist or very severe weather; and the windows 

 ought to have outward shutters, both for excluding excessive heat and exces- 

 sive cold. In every apartment there ought to be a window opposite to the 

 door, in order to create a thorough draft, when both are opened, and also a 

 valve in the roof, to admit the escape of the hottest and lightest air. Every 

 door ought to have a small opening at the bottom, for the admission of the 

 fowls when the door is shut. The elevation should be a simple style, and 

 there may be a pigeonry over the centre building. The roost is sometimes a 

 mere floor or loft, to which the birds fly up or ascend by a ladder; at other 

 times it is nothing more than the coupling timbers of the roof, or a series of 

 cross battens or rods, rising in gradation from the floor to the roof. The battens 

 should be placed at such a distance horizontally as that the birds, when roost- 

 ing, may not incommode each other by their droppings. For this purpose 

 they should be a foot apart for hens, and eighteen inches apart for turkies. 

 The slope of the roost may be about 45, and the lower part should lift up by 

 hinges in order to permit a person to remove the dung. No flying is requisite 

 in case of such a roost, as the birds ascend and descend by steps, see figure 38, 

 in which (a, 6) are spars for the poultry to sit on (c, c) ranges of boxes for 

 nests, (d) the roof, (e) the door, which should be nearly as high as the ceiling, 

 for ventilation, and should have a small opening with a shutter at bottom, to 

 permit the poultry to go in and out at pleasure. The spars on which the 

 clawed birds are to roost, should not be roufid and smooth, but roundish and 

 roughish like the branch of a tree. 



Feeding-houses, in which are troughs with water and food 

 placed all around, so that the fowls may feed constantly and 

 without interruption, must be employed when fowls are reared 

 in large numbers for sale. Poulterers know how to feed fowls 

 with great expedition; and their method seems to be to give 

 every kind of nourishing food. It is, indeed, under every cir- 

 35 



