PO UL TR T- CRAFT. 97 



cheap (as it is in some places), a good way to feed is to cook it and feed 

 in troughs instead of mash. It should not be fed regularly in this way. There 

 are numerous varieties. Those having the largest grains give best satisfaction 

 as chicken feed. 



125. Linseed Meal and Cotton Seed Meal are very rich in albumen, 

 and may be fed in small proportions in mashes, though those who can get corn, 

 wheat, and oat products in abundance have little need of .either of these. 



126. Other By-Products and Waste Products from Grain. There 

 are many of these most of them available only in the vicinities of the factories 

 from which they come, though some, extensively used in cattle feeding, are 

 kept in stock by large feed dealers generally. Few have been practically 

 tested as poultry foods. Trials of such food stuffs ought to be based on 

 knowledge of their composition, and of the general laws of feeding, as given 

 in the next chapter. Haphazard tests of food accomplish little. 



127. Waste Bread. Near large cities waste bread is an important item 

 in the poultry food supply. Much of it is not broken at all simply stale 

 bread. A mixed lot of broken bread gives a very complete ration, for it con- 

 tains a great variety, white, brown, graham, and corn breads, broken cakes, 

 muffins, etc. It is fed in various ways : dry, crumbled ; moist, crumbled ; 

 simply moistened with milk or water : soaked to a pulp in warm water, then 

 thickened with meal and bran, or middlings. Some poultrymen use no other 

 soft food. It is very cheap. Fed with whole corn to fowls on good range, it 

 makes a most economical and satisfactory ration. 



CRACKER CRUMBS, stale and broken crackers, are also used as food for 

 chicks. 



128. Meat Foods. BEEF SCRAPS, DRIED BLOOD, ANIMAL MEAL, 

 PORK SCRAPS, LARD CRACKLINGS are all used as poultry foods. An excess 

 of animal food in a ration causes digestive troubles : it is not, therefore, 

 advisable to feed the whole meat ration in the mash. If a part of it is fed 

 separately, fowls are not likely to over-eat of it. Fowls over-fed with meat will 

 at last refuse a mash containing it; but the mischief is done before the fowls 

 are forced to refuse the food. 



GREEN BONE and many of the prepared meat foods contain much mineral 

 matter needed for bone and for shells. 



RAW LEAN BEEF is a good animal food when it can be had for little or 

 nothing. As by far the greater part of its bulk is water, the feeder cannot 

 afford to pay much for it, with prepared foods as cheap as they are. 



HORSE MEAT. The meat of a healthy horse killed for cause, can be used 

 as poultry food ; but ordinary " horse meat" is unfit for fowls. 



