WwW 
ty 
Phosphate of Iron given also daily in water. This 
is a splendid tonic for a weak or ailing bird. 
For Wounds.—Sometimes a bird will get its 
head nearly scalped, its forehead knocked, or its 
shoulder butts scraped raw, with flying against the 
wire. 
Wash the wound clean and dry it gently, then 
smear on a little vaseline or ‘‘New Skin.’? The 
latter is an antiseptic, and dries in a few moments 
after being applied, forming a coating over the 
wound. Care must be taken to cleanse the place 
first or you only seal the germs in. It smarts very 
much at first, but has a soothing feeling later. 
The bird should be held till the application has 
dried. 
Roup.—This is a most dangerous and infectious 
disease. I have found Bleeding Heart pigeons 
especially liable to it, and have also had one case 
of a delicate young Bronzewing that caught the 
infection and died. .\ bird suffering from roup 
may, for the first few days, look as if little ailed it, 
but a close observation will show the beak slightly 
open, and on examination you will find one or more 
small whitish growths under the skin inside the 
mouth and throat. If these are not removed and 
the afflicted parts dressed they quickly increase in 
size and fill up the throat till the bird dies of 
suffocation. 
J once had an outbreak of roup amongst my 
birds (though they were in an heated aviary), and 
at the time it started J knew of no sure remedy. 
I thought that to try and remove the growths only 
was but to torture the sufferer; further, I did not 
care much for handling a bird with roup. I have 
read that blood-poisoning may in this way be con- 
veyed to human beings if there is any scratch on 
the hands. I did nothing for a fine cock Bleeding 
Heart, and hoped against hope he would recover. 
He seemed fairly well for over a week, but had 
increasing difficulty in swallowing food, and one 
morning was found dead. The next bird attacked 
was a hen, and later two other hens. I felt I could 
not bear to see my little flock of nine Bleeding 
Hearts die off one by one, so put my feelings on 
one side and searched for a remedy. I found in 
one of my ‘‘bird’’ newspaper-cuttiny books a letter 
taken from The Feathered World advising Jeyes’ 
Branalcane, so I got a bottle and found it a 
splendid dressing, and all three birds recovered. 
I removed the growths first. The pared and 
blunted cedar end of a camel’s-hair brush makes 
a very good instrument, a clean piece of rag 
should be placed handy, and a pot of water to drop 
the growths into as they are removed (as they 
must be burnt to prevent the infection spreading) ; 
a few drops of Branalcane should be poured out 
into a second pot to paint out the mouth when 
MY FOREIGN DOVES AND PIGEONS. 
it has been cleared. It 
is any easy operation to 
do by yourself if you 
get all your things ready 
Jirst. The bird is held 
firmly in the left hand, 
the beak slightly prised 
open with the wooden 
end of the brush, and 
then kept in this 
position by pressing the 
tip of the beak against 
the first finger of the 
left hand. If the growth is far back tilt the bird’s 
head rather backwards. The thumb should be 
round the neck, the second finger acts as a perch 
for the bird’s feet. Don’t try to do too much at 
once—give a few moments’ rest now and then. 
When finished, dress with Branalcane with the 
brush, washing it out well afterwards. 
I gave the affected birds a few drops of phos- 
phate of iron daily in their water as a tonic, and 
of course kept them from the healthy stock, not 
in another aviary, but apart in cages. 
Starvation.—This seeins a strange thing for 
well-fed birds to suffer from, yet it is not un- 
common where a number ef birds are kept in one 
aviary. Perhaps through the winter they agree 
well, then with the oncoming of spring one cock 
will turn a tyrant, and unknown to you may keep 
a shyer bird from the food till it loses flesh and 
becomes very weals. You will easily discover the 
mischief by noticing if any bird seems hiding 
away. Probably on your driving it out the 
aggressor will advance, and the sufferer quickly 
retire again, telling its own tale of fear. The 
remedy is obvious—remove the bird to other 
quarters, or, better still, keep it for a time by itself 
and give a tonic in its water; and to prevent a 
recurrence spend a few minutes each day very 
quietly watching your birds, standing quite still, 
and not just “looking round” the aviary and going 
out again. You will find you may learn very much 
even from one day’s observation, and the birds, 
losing their fear of you, will be seen under natural 
conditions. 
Eee-binding and Constipalion.—Warm olive oil 
is the simplest remedy for either of these distress- 
ing complaints. Fortunately, doves very seldom 
suffer from either. For egg-binding, blow up the’ 
feathers gently and let a drop or two of oil soak’ 
into the inflamed part, letting it drop gently off 
your paint brush. Also paint the surrounding 
parts, but be careful not to soil the feathers with 
oil. Take a little of the warm oil in the toothpick 
(having first rounded its end) and, carefully open- 
ing the bird’s beak a little with the toothpick, let 
the oil run down the throat. Keep the bird in the: 
DwarF TurtTLeE Dove. 
