POULTRT-CRAFT. 223 



universal. Many growers provide suitable buildings for both old and young 

 turkeys ; some turn them out in summer, and house in winter ; some, while 

 leaving the turkeys free to roost outdoors, provide, near the usual roosting 

 places, sheltered perches to which the fowls may go in severe weather. This 

 latter method is unsatisfactory, is in fact quite useless, (except as a sop to 

 the conscience of the keeper) , because it is only when a storm is uncommonly 

 rough at roosting time that turkeys will desert their usual perches for shelter. 

 Some will not do it voluntarily under any circumstances. 



Turkeys certainly need shelter sometimes. (This most of the advocates of 

 the open air method admit) . To suppose that they do not, is to assume that 

 the laws of nutrition are reversed when applied to turkeys in bad weather. 

 Young turkeys in preparation for market, exposed to the cold storms of fall 

 and early winter, cannot make the weights they would if protected ; it is 

 not possible. If breeding stock subjected to the rigors of a northern winter, 

 attains the development or keeps the condition it would if sheltered which 

 is, to say the least, very doubtful it is at increased cost for maintenance. 

 Now it is a principle and a fundamental one of profitable poultry culture, 

 that the poultryman ought always to be prepared for those contingencies, 

 which, though the exact time of their occurrence is uncertain, he knows are 

 sure to happen. In the matter of shelter, for instance, the wise poultryman 

 provides such accommodations, and so habituates his fowls to use them, that 

 when the weather is worst the fowls can be kept comfortable, and that with- 

 out the keeper being obliged to do extra work under disagreeable conditions. 

 And it is surely no more than common prudence for a turkey grower who 

 wants to make the most of his opportunities, to provide suitable quarters and 

 train the birds to roost under cover, at least through that portion of the year 

 when cold rough weather prevails. 



Turkeys do not need as warm houses as chickens. Wherever the winter is 

 not severe, a shed with front of slats or strong wire netting is sufficient. Even 



that the trend of progress and of some of the best teachings on turkey topics is toward 

 the best methods of the chicken keepers. That the precise methods used for chickens 

 will ever be applied to turkeys, does not appear at all probable ; but in whatever respects 

 popular methods of handling turkeys are not truly economical and humane to the fowls 

 and to the keener, the changes already made by a few growers are sure to be more widely 

 adopted. Much of the close adherence to old methods has been due to the prevalent belief 

 that as turkeys are not as completely domesticated as other fowls, they cannot thrive unless 

 allowed to continue many of the habits of their wild ancestors. Treatment of them has 

 proceeded on the assumption that they are essentially different, in nature, from other 

 domestic fowls. This assumption is correct in so far as it asserts that turkeys generally 

 now have certain habits, different from those of thoroughly domesticated fowls, which 

 habits render them less amenable to methods which suit the keeper ; but it is wrong in 

 that it presumes that these habits cannot be modified. The turkey is undoubtedly capa- 

 ble of becoming as completely domesticated as the hen (chicken), and it is highly proba- 

 ble that such modification of habits would be followed by increased prolificacy a most 

 desirable improvement. 



