492 COMMERCIAL POULTRY RAISING 



naturally they are extremely indigestible; they are likely to 

 form. a mat inside the crop, and to obstruct the canal leading 

 from the crop to the gizzard. 



Causes.— The vice usually starts through fighting or accidents, 

 or it may develop through lack of sufficient mineral and animal 

 food— generally from insufficient animal food. It is also caused 

 by -idleness — close confinement or no opportunity for exercise. 

 The vice spreads rapidly throughout an entire flock, unless the 

 ringleaders are promptly caught and removed. Erroneous meth- 

 ods of feeding and management are largely responsible for this 



(Courtesy Atlantic Farm) 

 Fig. 306. — Ducks can be raised without water, but not so successfully as with it. 



trouble, so that the poultryman seldom has anyone to blame but 

 himself, and the same general conditions are likely to encourage 

 egg eating — another pernicious habit. 



There is no medical treatment for feather eating, an>- more 

 than the amount of animal food should be increased, and the 

 fowls given as much liberty and exercise as possible. If the pens 

 are small and the yards' are destitute of green food, and there is 

 no room in which to increase the range, the habit is sometimes 

 controlled by changing the fowls to a different pen. This change 

 in environment may arrest their attention long enough for the 

 alteration in their-diet to satisfy their peculiar craving for blood. 



