CHAPTEE VIII. 



MANAGEMENT OF PHEASANTS IN CONFINEMENT 

 (CONTINUED). 



^S 



REAEING^ THE YOUNG BIRDS. 



;,UCCESS in the rearing of young birds, it cannot 

 be too strongly impressed on the inexperienced 

 pheasant rearer, is never the reward of those who 

 practise perpetual intermeddling with the sitting hens. 

 All interference at the time the eggs are hatching is 

 injurious ; nevertheless, there are fussy people who 

 cannot imagine that anything can progress rightly without 

 their assistance; when the eggs are chipping they disturb 

 the fowl to see how many are billed; this is generally 

 resented by the hen, who sinks down on her eggs, and most 

 probably crushes one or two of them, and thus renders the 

 escape of the young birds almost impossible. It is perfectly 

 true that sometimes an unhatched bird that would otherwise 

 be unable to extricate itself, may be assisted out of the shell 

 and survive, but it is no less certain that for one whose life 

 is preserved in this manner a score are sacrificed to the 

 meddling curiosity of the interferer. 



The chicks should be left under the hen till they are 

 twenty-four hours old without being disturbed ; by this time 

 the yolk which is absorbed into the intestines at the period of 

 hatching will have been digested, and the young birds 

 become strong enough to run from under the parent hen. 

 If the fowl is set in one of the coops with a wire run, such 



I 2 



