REARING THE YOUNG BIRDS. 75 
meat being composed of sheep’s heads and plucks, taken from the bone and finely 
minced, and just sufficient of the broth to form a dry crumbly paste. At five 
weeks old I consider a feed of good wheat and barley alternately, the last thing at 
night, quite necessary, not forgetting, at this age, to add a little tonic solution 
of sulphate of iron to their water daily. At this time their feathers require a 
great deal of support, and if the bodily strength is not supported by a strengthening 
diet, they must give way. Continue the custard up to eight weeks old, but adding 
more meal to it, with the green food. Give one sort of food at a time (just 
so much that they eat it clean up), and attendance every hour from the time you 
commence to feed until shut up for the night. Change the water repeatedly during 
the day.” 
With regard to the coops employed for the hens with young pheasants, a 
form much recommended is one made like a box, 3ft. long, 2ft. wide, and 2ft. high 
in front, sloping off to 1ft. high at the back, and having a movable boarded floor 
that may be employed if the ground be wet. The birds ought to have a further 
space of about two yards square to run in, fenced in by sparrow-proof wire netting. 
A good coop of this kind is made by F. Crook, of Motcombe-street, and is shewn 
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in the cut. The inclosed run, which is proof against rats and sparrows, &c., affords 
a sufficient space for the exercise of the young birds for the first few days after 
hatching, after which the coops should be placed without the wire runs in the spot 
where the young birds are to be reared, the grass, if high, having been mown 
around some short time previously, so that the young shoots and tender clover may 
be growing for the use of the birds. Mr. Reynolds, of Old Compton-street, has some 
admirable coops of a similar kind. The advantages of these arrangements have been 
very ably set forth by Mr. ,T. C. Cade, of Spondon, Derby. He writes: ‘“ There 
is a great saving of food, as small birds are excluded by the wire netting; and it 
is also practicable to put down a good supply of food at night, so that the young 
pheasants may be able to feed as soon as they wake, and not be kept waiting, 
according to the usual plan, for two or three hours during the long summer 
mornings before they are let out. My birds are never shut in the coop at night, 
the wire netting being sufficient protection against vermin and cats. I do not know 
whether any of your readers have ever accompanied their keeper on a hot summer 
morning when he is letting the young birds out of the coops. If not, let them do 
so, and but put their noses within a foot of the coop, and I will venture to say 
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