320 The Illustrated Book oe Poultry. 



partial shelter during rain. These coops, in some parishes, may be seen about everywhere — on the 

 strips of grass at the sides of the roads, in odd corners, in front of cottages, and in the fields. The 

 whole district abounds in what are called small farms ; and as every occupant of one of these farms, 

 almost without exception, is a chicken-breeder, the connection we have already pointed out in 

 Chapter VIII. between the small occupations usual in France and the enormous poultry products 

 of that country receives what may be almost said to be actual demonstration from the connection 

 between similar causes and effects in the chief chicken-raising district of England. The cottagers 

 also breed chickens, however, some of them producing 200 annually; and the thriving condition 

 of many engaged in this business is certainly worthy the attention of all interested in the " small 

 occupation" question which has recently attracted so much notice. 



Except at very late and early seasons, the coops are left out all night (they must be honest 

 folk in Sussex), but are moved sufficiently often to prevent the ground smelling offensively. Here 

 is the secret of the success, for deaths are almost unknown. While young they are fed very 

 often, and afterwards three or four times a day, the food being the ground oats we have already 

 spoken of, made into a thick paste with water ; milk is not used till the fattening commences. 

 The treatment is found to answer, and the birds to thrive, even in parishes where the soil is of 

 a clayey character, though undoubtedly the chalk districts do the best. This shows that cir- 

 cumstances (such as a large and intelligent cottage population, with small allotments) tending 

 to good management, have far more eftect on poultry production than mere advantages of climate 

 or situation. 



Usually the fattening of the chickens is a distinct business from both the raising and the 

 selling. The fatters collect from the raisers ; fatten, kill, and dress the birds all ready on stated days 

 for the "higglers," who pack and send them to the London market; some higglers, in the busy 

 season, being known to send over 1,500 birds to market in one week. The fattening is generally 

 completed in about ten days, the birds being always in very good condition to start with, and the 

 food given is almost always the same ground oats the chickens have been fed upon before, but now 

 made with milk into a thick gruel. This is given twice daily, the birds being allowed to feed 

 themselves. Of late, however, a somewhat different system has been inaugurated, and at the close of 

 1870 there was published in a weekly journal an interesting account of a visit to the establishment 

 of Mr. Olliver, of Warbleton, in which the birds are crammed by machines similar to that described 

 by us in page 83. Warbleton is very near Heathfield, which is a very active centre of the chicken- 

 raising district, and in fact the very locality to which most of the preceding description* more 

 especially applies. Heathfield is itself, by the way, a clay soil ; but this, as already remarked, does 

 not seem to interfere much with its production of poultry, which we have seen to depend upon 

 other reasons. At Mr. Olliver's establishment Mr. Crook (the writer of the article in question) 

 found the chickens fattening in " very long thatched sheds, the sides of which were constructed of 

 alternate uprights of rough-hewn timber, the intervening spaces being filled up with bundles of 

 faggots. These sheds were about eighty feet long by about six feet wide, and along either side 

 were continuous rows of coops full of chickens. The coops were capable of holding about one 

 dozen in each, and were entirely composed of wooden bars or rails, so that there were no offensive 

 accumulations. The object of making the sides of the sheds of faggots was stated to be for the 

 purpose of securing plenty of fresh air, but which did not enter in upon the birds like a draught, 

 but percolated through the faggots : thus the birds were kept in health." In three of these sheds 



• It is only right to state that for many details in that description we have been indebted to some notes of a visit to Heathfield 

 published in the Journal of Horticulture of October 7th, 1S69. 



