CHAPTER XX 
THE INTENSIVE SYSTEM 
O keep a bird confined under one roof is the essence of 
the intensive system. The phrase is not a particularly 
happy one, being evidently adapted from intensive 
gardening, which expresses something quite different, but once 
forced into the currency of our language the words “intensive 
system ”’ have come to stay. In this system the birds are never 
allowed out of the house, and are usually kept on wooden floors 
covered with litter of some kind so as to take off the strain of the 
hard wood and to give them exercise in scratching for their food. 
As a rule such houses are built with very open fronts, protected 
only by wind and rain screens in the event of a storm. The idea is 
to give the birds all the fresh air possible without letting them out 
into the open. It may at first seem strange that anyone should 
think of keeping the birds in a comfortable prison-house when 
they might be running about outside picking up what natural 
food is available and enjoying the liberty that all animals seem to 
crave. Intensive houses in towns and crowded places may be a 
necessity, and we know that birds thrive and lay well under such 
conditions, but it looks like asking for trouble to coop up the 
birds where plenty of space and grass runs are available. Yet 
there are those who keep fowls in large numbers under intensive 
conditions in the country, and many of them are satisfied that the 
results are at least equal to any other system of poultry-keeping. 
No one can offer a word of criticism against intensive poultry- 
keeping in towns, and no one who has not some experience of it 
is entitled to attack the system anywhere. I have never kept 
fowls wholly intensively, but I know those who do, and so long 
as they are satisfied with the results, that is all that matters. 
Some farmers occasionally keep birds both intensively and semi- 
174 
