The Dust Bath. 249 



who know the value of such a bath, both in summer 

 and winter, consider it essential to successful poultry keep- 

 ing. And how few of our poultry keepers there are, 

 who give their fowls an opportunity of revelling in a 

 heap of loose earth or ashes, either in the hatching season, 

 or when the ground is damp and they cannot obtain it 

 naturally. The dust bath is to poultry, nature's cleaner 

 and renovator, and is as necessary for cleansing the feathers 

 of fowls from vermin and effete matter, as a cool pure water 

 bath is to the person of cleanly habits. Poultry with free 

 range in summer, will be able to help themselves to a dust 

 bath, if they have to roll in the newly made flower or 

 vegetable beds, but with fowls in confinement the means 

 and material must be supplied. A dry mass of fine sand 

 or road dust, fine loam or coal ashes, old mortar, or in fact 

 anything of that kind will do. This mass of dry material 

 should be under a shed to protect it from rain, in summer 

 time, and in the sunniest corner of the hen-house or shed 

 in winter. A capital plan is to have a small shed adjoining 

 the fowl house, with or without a connection thereto, and 

 devote this entirely to the purposes of the dust bath. Such 

 a shed need not be more than a couple of feet high, and 

 should be entirely open at the front, with a sloping roof to 

 keep out the rain. 



If we watch the habits of all wild birds, we can see them 

 in the open clearings and on the country roads, at early 

 sunrise, dusting themselves as rapidly as possible ; and if 

 we give our domestic fowls a chance, we can see an instinctive 

 desire in the young, as well as the old, to scratch, and pul- 

 verize the earth, if in lumps, and they will then adjust their 

 feathers, arid by the rapid action of their claws dust them- 

 selves thoroughly, and by shaking, rid themselves of lice. 

 The dust bath is made more effective by putting a handful 



