214 POULTRY CULTURE 



Special preparation of food for poultry. With the exception of 

 cracked corn the hard grains fed to poultry require no preparation. 

 Though they are sometimes mixed before feeding, it has never 

 been shown that there is any advantage in the practice. Ground 

 grains and by-products usually require some preparation. Vege- 

 tables, fruits, and hay are fed with or without special preparation, 

 according to the nature of the article and to circumstances. In 

 general, the poultry keeper who has reduced the labor of poultry 

 keeping to the minimum does nothing in preparing food for the 

 birds that they could do for themselves without undue waste. 

 Variations in this practice are usually for economic reasons, econ- 

 omy of time as well as of feed materials being considered. To 

 some extent custom and habit fix practice, many continuing to do 

 some parts of their work by methods not the most economical 

 for them, though in general, their work is on an economical basis. 



Mashes. Ground foods as fed to poultry are called mashes. Pri- 

 marily and properly the term " mash" applies to a moist mixture of 

 ground grain stuffs, either raw or cooked. The term "mash" was 

 generally used in that sense until a few years ago, when the practice 

 of feeding these foods without wetting gained some popularity, and 

 the food in this form began to be called a dry mash. 1 



The practice of feeding mashes possibly arose first in connection 

 with the feeding of kitchen and table waste containing large pro- 

 portions of liquid or semiliquid foods (as soups, gravies, puddings, 

 etc.), full utilization of which required that they be thickened 

 with ground grain. As the numbers of birds increased until 

 the table-waste mash was insufficient, cheap vegetables and meats 

 were often cooked and, with the water they were cooked in, made 

 the basis of a mash. When these were not available, mashes were 

 made of ground grains alone. The great advantage of the mash of 

 table waste was in the variety of rich and palatable foods that it 

 added to the ration. This advantage is continued in less degree in 

 mashes containing vegetables and meat, though mashes of the lat- 

 ter kind have far less variety and are often altogether lacking in 

 the seasoning articles, salt, pepper, mustard, etc., considerable 

 quantities of which are in refuse from the table. 



1 The term "dry mash " is a misnomer, but as it has come into general use, it is 

 retained to avoid confusion. 



