THE POULTRY-YARB. 299 



food (when chickens show strong human tendencies !) ; and 

 one day, after seeing a hawk pounce down before our very 

 face into this little yard, carry off number thirty to our 

 knowledge (and it might have been more) , one day — we 

 repeat, after having had our feathers ruffled in this manner 

 we bethought us of having read somewhere that birds, 

 and especially haw^ks, would never descend below a line 

 stretched across their downward path ; so we straightway 

 put the idea into practice, running a few lines of ordinary 

 twine back and forth over the nursery, just high enough 

 to escape striking our head. 



We had not much faith in the remedy, for the disease 

 was desperate ; but it is a remarkable fact that from that 

 day, six years ago, to the present, we have never lost a 

 single chick by hawks, except such as managed to stray 

 outside their fortress, which was not properly closed at the 

 base of the fencing. 



With an inclosure such as we have described, and wire 

 or tarred twine, tarred to make it durable, drawn across it 

 from the top of eight- or ten-foot poles, no chicks will be 

 lost by hawks, skunks, opossums, or any other foes of 

 poultrydom. 



A roomy shed, or shelter, placed in the center of the 

 nursery, will afford shade and protection from rain, and 

 here the coops should be placed, unless there are large 

 trees here and there, or a Scuppernong grape canopy, to 

 take the place of the less sightly shed. Place the coops 

 near the outer edge of the latter, facing inward, a wide 

 board being placed before each coop, with a narrow ledge 

 running around it, like a shallow^ dish ; place the feed for 

 the household on this, and there wdll be no dirt mixed with 

 it, and none lost on the ground, for the ledge will prevent 

 its being scattered off the board. Keep here also, at all 

 times, a supply of cracked oyster-shells and bones; it is 



