National Standard Squab Book. 17 



job, but buy a coil of No. IS or 20 iron wire and weave this from oue 

 selvage to another of your wire nettiug, in and out of the meshes, and 

 you have the best joint you can get, and a ship-shape job. 



You can line the three walls of the interior of your squab house with 

 nests if you choose. The fourth wall is the oue in which the window or 

 windows are. Ou this fourth wall you should not have nest boxes, but 

 perches. These perches, or roosts, should be tacked up about 15 inches 

 apart, so as to give the birds room without interfering with each other. 

 The advantage of the V-shaped roo.st which we advise is that a bird 

 perched on it cannot soil the bird underneath. Do not buy the patent 

 pigeon roosts whidh you see advertised, for a pigeon roosting on one will 

 soil the pigeon roo.=;ting' on the one immediately below. 



I'leasc note particularly at this point the following terms which we use, 

 and do not become confused. The nest box is something in which rests 

 the nappy or other nest pan in which the nest is built. Do not say or 

 tliink of nests when yon mean nest boxes. 



The nest boxes, when done, should look like the pigeon holes of a desk, 

 and should be about one foot high, one foot wide and one foot deep. A 

 variation either way of an inch or two will not matter. 



One way to get these pigeon holes is to build them of nice pine lumber, 

 in the form of boxing one-half or tive-cighths of an inch thick. Another 

 way is to use hemlock or spruce boards one inch thick. The third way 

 (which we think is the best for the beginner who wishes to start cheapest 

 and quickest) is to use egg crates, or orange boxes. These egg crates are 

 two feet long, one foot wide and one foot deep, but they are divided in the 

 middle by a partition, giving two spaces, each of a cubic foot, and this is 

 just what the squab raiser wants. They are procurable almost anywhere 

 in the United States and Canada trand new for ten or fifteen cents each, 

 aud if you buy them after the egg shippers are through with them, you 

 can get them for three to five cents apiece. Some grocers will be glad 

 to have you earry them away and will charge yon nothing for them. The 

 crates are built of thin, tough wood and usually are neat and solid. Take 

 oft the covers and throw the covers away, you do not need them. Then 

 put one egg crate on its side, open top out, and place another egg crate 

 on top of that, and so on until yon have covered the three walls of your 

 squab house from the floor to the roof. Do not use any nails, they are 

 not necessary, the crates will keep in position by their weight. It is an 

 advantage, also, to have them loose, for when you clean the nests, you 

 can step up on a chair or box, take down the crates, commencing with 

 the top, and clean each one with your feet on the floor. If yon build a 

 substantial set of nest boxes of boxing or hemlock lumber, you will have 

 to stand on a chair and strain your arms in order to clean the top nest 

 boxes, so jou see their are points in the low-priced arrangement not pos- 

 sessed by the fancy kind. It is on the same principle by which a humble 

 small boy with bent pin and worms and an old pole catches more fish than 

 (he city angler with a $25 assortment of hooks, lines and artificial flies. 



