CHAPTER VI. 



CONCERNING PIGEON'S MILK. 



About twenty years at;u the subject of Pioeon's milk 

 caused some little excitement owing; to the publication 

 of an article advancing the theory that the milk secre- 

 tion did not take place until the birds felt the movement 

 of the young in the eggs which they had been inctibat- 

 ing, and that such secretion was dependent upon the 

 movement of the squab in the egg. Personally, .judg- 

 ing from my own observations in a somewhat lengthy 

 experience of Fantails, Owls, Nuns, Tumblers, Show 

 and Working Homers, 'my conchtsions are op])Osed to 

 this. With Fantails, one gets more clear eggs than 

 with any other variety, and it is not all utiusual in a very 

 high-class stud for seventy-five per cent., or even more, 

 to be clear in the first round; and as with birds of such 

 a highly strung nervous temperament as Fantails, it 

 would not be wise to destroy the eggs and set the birds 

 going as soon as it is found they are unfertile, they 

 are generally allowed to sit the whole time, or nearh- 

 the whole time, before being disturbed. My exper- 

 ience has been when birds have been sitting on clear 

 eggs that the milk, or soft food, has come just the 

 same as when the eggs have been fertile, and often have 

 I handled my birds on the fifteenth, sixteenth, and 

 seventeenth days to discover if this were so or not. 



IN GENERAL AGREEJIENT. 



It is generally considered that unless birds are 

 allowed to feed off the soft food that serious conse- 

 quences are, of necessity, botmd to follow. Whilst 

 agreeino- that it is better if the soft food can be fed oft' 

 in the manner intended by Nature, I have never worried 

 myself because mv birds were unable to so feed it off. 

 When I have not had youngsters to put under birds with 



