KILLING AND COOLING 81 



operator should moisten his thumb and forefinger in a basin 

 of water, to give him a grip on the feathers. They come off 

 easily and an experienced picker will work very rapidly. A 

 sharp pen-knife, or knife such as shoemakers use, is necessary 

 to remove some of the pin feathers. They should be shaved 

 off. 



Ignorance of how to cool the killed squabs properly has 

 discouraged many a squab raiser. If you throw the squabs 

 in a pile on the floor after you have tweaked their necks, you 

 will have a fermenting mass and the following morning, 

 when you are ready to ship, many of the bodies will be dark- 

 colored at the place of contact with the floor, or with other 

 squabs, and decay will start from such discolored places. 

 Hang the bodies from the studding, as we have described, and 

 you wll cool them just right and you will be surprised that 

 this part of the business ever could have discouraged anybody. 



If you number the nails which you have driven into the 

 studding you will know just how many squabs you hang up, 

 and you will not have to handle the squabs a second time to 

 count them. 



The ideal squab which brings the highest price in the market 

 is not only large and plump, but has a clean crop, so that no 

 food will be left in it to sour. No blood shows anywhere on 

 the body and its feet are clean. Ship in small quantities, 

 especially in the summer. Do not pack in an enormous box, 

 or the bottom layers will suffer. 



A squab should be killed, as we have stated, when from 

 three to four weeks old, most generally at four weeks. Do 

 not wait until it is five or six weeks old, when it may have left 

 the nest. As soon as a squab is old enough to get out of the 

 nest and walk around on the floor of the squab house, it 

 quickly trains off its fat and grows lean and slender. Its 

 flesh also loses its pure white co or and takes on a darker 

 shade. You do not want either of these two conditions. 



If you tie up your killed squabs by the feet when shipping 

 to market, do not tie a lean with a fat squab, for if you do the 

 dealer probably will give you the price of the lean one. Put 

 the fat squabs in one bunch and the lean squabs in another 

 bunch. If you are shipping to two dealers, you can very 

 often get the top price from both by giving one your best 

 squabs and the other your second best. 



