THE VALUE OF FASTING. 153 



work. So the poultryman should watch closely for sigus of Indigestion, especially lack of 

 appetite or looseness of the bowels, and when such symptoms appear let the hens go without 

 grain for a feed or several feeds, as the case may seem lo require. Careful attention to this 

 point is the best preventive of digestive disorders. I have found it a good plan to omit one 

 feed a week as a regular thing, and for many years have made it a practice to give the fowjs 

 one less feed on Sunday. 



Another point of importance In the treatment of ailing fowls is to know when to let them 

 alone — when to do nothing further than to put them in a quiet comfortable place, and let 

 nature take its course. As an economical question I think that the poultry keeper who U 

 wisest will adopt this sort of let alone treatment as his general policy, making exceptions only 

 in the case of a fowl of unusual importance to him, or In cases where he feels sure a few very 

 simple treatments will suffice. But apart from the economical question there is the question of 

 when letting alone will be the best treatment for the fowl. This can only be determined by 

 experience and experiment. When a number of fowls are sick at the same time, and with the 

 same trouble, try treating a part and leaving the rest to recover if nature Is able to work a 

 recovery. You will be surprised to find how often the fowls that have no treatment recover 

 just as quickly as the others. 



Whenever a poultryman finds things going wrong in his flock, with no special cause for It 

 that he can discover, he should sit down and consider whether there is anything in his situation 

 or his methods, or any special condition existing, not in accordance with generally accepted 

 ideas of correct conditions and methods, and whether any possible connection can be traced 

 between his departure from usual things and the trouble that has arisen. In a majority of 

 instances' it will be found that the common practice of poultrymen is the safest to follow. 



