58 MANAGEMENT OF PHEASANTS IN CONFINEMENT. 
“Our aviary here being within easy flight of natural coverts, we adopt clipping 
in preference to pinioning, since, when the egg harvest closes, by extracting the 
crippled feathers, a gradual recovery of power enables the birds one by one to effect 
escape; the exodus thus permitted being generally fully accomplished im sufficient 
time for a thorough cleaning and preparation of the aviary in readiness for its 
proposed future young occupants. One of the great secrets of success lies in 
variety of dry and liberality of green food, together with a generous supply of 
frequently changed water, gravel or road grit, ashes, chalk, and pounded bones. 
“T now propose offering a few suggestions touching more particularly the 
position, construction, and general management of the pheasant pens or aviaries. It 
may, however, be premised that their size and the numbers of birds proposed to be kept, 
greatly modifies many minor matters of detail, with reference not only to the health, 
but also to the comfort of the prisoners. On the all-important question of site—fair 
contiguity to the keeper’s cottage should be observed; placed at too great a distance, 
a laxity, in winter more especially, of that solicitude so essential to their welfare, 
is likely to be engendered; while on the other hand close proximity, above all 
should there be many children, may, with all their custcdian’s care, prove the cause 
of great and irrevocable mischief. Total isolation, again, in the recesses of a deep, 
secluded covert, renders the birds so nervously sensitive, that they are apt, upon the 
slightest unexpected excitement, to lose all self-control, dash about, and thus risk 
eggs, limbs, and even life. 
“Our pens are placed within five yards of, and parallel to, a leading carriage 
drive, a thoroughfare daily in use. From earliest youth, therefore, the birds are 
more or less inured to the ever-changing sights and sounds incidental te ordinary 
traffic. Their thus seeing and hearing all going on around gradually enables them 
to acquire such an amount of courage, that curiosity usurps the place of fright; 
the cocks crowing joyously yet defiantly, while the hens peer inquisitively, yet 
fearlessly, through the lattice of their harems. The pens should be sufficiently 
shielded by trees, so as to insure in very sunny weather a grateful shade; never- 
theless, too much leafy shelter is apt to prove provocative of damp and cold. 
They should also, while enjoying a southern aspect, be well protected from the east 
wind. Thus placed the birds are better left without any well-meant but fanciful 
attempts at further increasing their comfort. The little matters above enumerated 
excepted, the more they are exposed to the elements and permitted to rough it, 
the healthier and more robust will they become. 
“ As in our present case here, so it frequently occurs that insufficient space 
mititates against that annual shifting of aviaries on to new ground, so often recom- 
mended, and upon which, so far as my experience serves me, where the utmost 
attentions to scrupulous cleanliness has been observed, unnecessary stress is laid. 
“ After the laying season, when our birds have availed themselves of the 
