1:25 Rearing the Young Birds. 



whole of the constituents are retained, and to them is added 

 the no less valuable ingredients of the egg. There is, in 

 fact, no comparison to be made between the nutritive values 

 of curd and custard. 



Gentles or the maggots of the bluebottle or flesh fly are 

 used by some keepers. They are generally obtained by 

 hanging up in the woods, at a distance from a human habita- 

 tion, some horseflesh, a dead rabbit, or the bodies of vermin 

 that have been killed, and the gentles are allowed to drop 

 into a tub of bran. The plan is necessarily offensive. A 

 much better plan, in situations where it can be employed, is 

 to allow the dead bodies of any animals to become thoroughly 

 fly-blown, and then to bury them a few inches in the soil, 

 as previously described. It is obvious, however, that this 

 plan cannot be pursued where the pheasants are reared under 

 hens confined in coops. Maggots can also be procured in the 

 neighbourhood of the sea coast by adopting the following 

 plan, recommended in Cornwall Simeon's " Stray Notes on 

 Fishing and Natural Historj\" 



" It is not, I think, generally known that maggots admir- 

 ably adapted for feeding young pheasants and partridges 

 can be procured from common seaweed. This should be 

 taken up as near low water mark as possible, placed in a heap, 

 and allowed to rot about a fortnight, after which it will be 

 found swarming with maggots, rather smaller than those bred 

 in flesh. The keeper from whom I learnt this dodge, a man 

 of considerable experience in his vocation, tells me that he 

 considers them, as food for j'oung birds, superior to flesh 

 maggots, inasmuch as they may be given in any quantity 

 without fear of causing surfeit." 



When the hens are cooped, as is necessary where numbers 

 of pheasants are reared, a good supply of fresh vegetable food 

 is absolutely necessarj'- ; and I believe that nothing surpasses 

 chopped lettuce, which should be running to seed, and con- 

 sequently milky, as the pheasants take to it much more readily 

 than they do to onions, watercress, etc., or other green food. 



