REARING AND FEEDING OF ANIMALS. 4^3 



feeding them, better and infinitely cheaper. Neither are they 

 as much trouble or impose as much care on the breeder as 

 some imagine. They are these: In the first days of the life 

 of the turkey, to secure it from the alternations of heat and 

 cold, of dry and wet, to give it proper economical food, and 

 not to lose sight of it till the red shoots. 



Turkeys should be allowed to enjoy themselves freely in 

 the open air; as soon as the red begins to shoot, the young 

 turkey manifests a desire to perch in the open air. Open sheds, 

 when they can be made secure against intrusion of enemies, 

 are best suited to them. By placing the bars on which they 

 roost several feet above the surface of the ground, the air that 

 surrounds them is constantly renewed. They require roomy 

 habitations, in order to preserve them from the effects of their 

 own infection. The place in which they are kept should not 

 only be well ventilated, but occasionally fumigated. They 

 cannot endure confinement even for a night in a filthy hen- 

 house. 



The scorching sun and rain are, above all, hurtful to young 

 turkeys, and it must be an indispensable care to shelter them 

 from the one and the other, at least during the first six weeks 

 or two months, which is about the time the weak stage lasts. 



Fattening turkeys is an easy process; at the commence- 

 ment of cold weather, when they are generally about six months 

 old, they are to receive better and more plentiful food, in order 

 to increase their size and plumpness expeditiously. For this 

 purpose their appetite must be well supplied, and the common 

 diet will answer; but if they have not one sufficiently keen, 

 they should be confined to the farm-yard. The following pre- 

 paration may be given to them every morning for a month or 

 six weeks. Boiled potatoes, mashed, and mixed with corn, 

 buckwheat or barley meal, according to local resources, made 

 into a paste or mush, and of which they may eat as much as 

 they can. Every evening the remains of the paste must be 

 carefully removed, and the vessel in which it had been put in 

 the morning, thoroughly cleansed. The food of this bird must 

 be kept clean, and the utmost care taken not to give them on 

 the morrow the remains of the paste of the preceding day. 



The turkey is not a hardy animal, and is subject to diseases 

 which may be avoided by proper treatment. Sometimes the 

 plumage bristles up all over the body, and they have a lan- 

 guishing aspect; on examining the feathers of the rump atten- 

 tively, two or three will be found whose quill part is filled 

 with blood; remove these and the poor turkey is soon restored 

 to health and strength. 

 35* 



