120 PHEASANTS FOB COVUBTS AND AVIABIES. 



a plentiful supply of water. Even when there is no rain, the 

 cloudless skies are productive of heavy dews, and the young 

 birds may be seen drinking the glistening drops off the grass 

 in the early morning. Some persons maintain that the ova 

 of the gape worm are taken in with the water gathered from 

 dewdrops on the grass ; others suggest that they occur in 

 rain-water, but there is no foundation for either of these 

 theories, as tho disease is strictly local, which would not be 

 the case if it were disseminated by a flying insect, by dew 

 or rain water, or by any animals inhabiting running water. 

 Much evil is produced by allowing the young pheasants to 

 drink water contaminated with their own excrement, which 

 is always the case if the water vessels are so constructed 

 that the young can run into them; where such water is 

 used, there can be no doubt of its injurious quality, but I 

 cannot imagine that fresh, clear water can be otherwise than 

 beneficial to the birds. 



A correspondent, who is a most successful breeder of 

 pheasants on a large scale, and whose young stock are in 

 splendid order, writes : " I may give as my opinion that it 

 is perfectly necessary to their health to have fresh spring 

 water. Indeed, my man last year used to go to one particular 

 spring to supply his birds, as it was better water. In their 

 wild state, immediately they are out of the nest, the hen 

 conducts them to the water, and in our wild Devonshire hills, 

 where a streamlet runs in every valley, you can always see 

 the well-defined paths of the broods to and from the water. 

 I have just asked my man, and he tells me that so well are 

 their water-loving propensities known, that poachers in large 

 breeding places always net in dry weather any springs 

 within reach of the coops, and often with success." Another 

 authority says: "I am strongly opposed to attempting to 

 rear pheasants without water, as against all nature ; but my 

 keeper adheres to his own opinion that for at least somo 

 weeks they should have it only once a day, bringing forward 

 cases of broods hatched in dry fields where no water flows. 



