342 TROPICAL AGRICULTURE 



Egypt, Sudan, Madagascar, Australia, New Zealand, South 

 America, and the United States. 



Commercial ostrich farming began in Oudtshoorn, South 

 Africa, in i860. From this date on the industry increased 

 rather rapidly, and at present Cape Colony has over 1,000,000 

 ostriches, Australia, 2,000, and the United States about 10,000 

 ostriches. The industry is important in the various other 

 countries named above, but statistics on their numbers are 

 wanting or unreliable. 



South Africa in 1913 exported 1,023,000 pounds of ostrich 

 feathers at a value of $14,000,000. In England, a campaign 

 was started against ostrich farming on the ground that the 

 plucking of the feathers was an act of cruelty. Ultimately, 

 an antiplumage bill was passed in 1913 and at about the 

 same time ostrich feathers began to go out of style in the 

 United States. This country imported $6,250,000 worth of 

 ostrich feathers in 1913, while the importation fell to the value 

 of only $3,900,000 in 1914. 



In the United States ostrich eggs are hatched almost en- 

 tirely by artificial incubation, the incubation period being six 

 weeks. About 95 per cent, of the eggs are fertile. In South 

 Africa, the eggs are hatched chiefly by the parent birds, but 

 also by incubators. The domestic habits of an ostrich family 

 are quite interesting. Sometimes the hen ostrich sits on the 

 eggs by day and the cock by night, while occasionally the 

 cock does nearly all of the incubating. The cock ostrich is 

 extremely pugnacious, even dangerously so, during the hatch- 

 ing season. 



Ostriches begin breeding at the age of three or four years 

 and continue to the age of 20 years or more. In Oudtshoorn, 

 the common practice is to pull the first feathers at the age 

 of 8 or 9 months. Six months later the primary feathers 

 are cut off and two months later the quills of the cut feathers 

 are pulled, thus giving three plumages in about 6 months and 

 about one pound of feathers per bird. 



