26 THE TRAP NEST TEXT BOOK 



such of my birds as declined to use the nests. There was something 

 the matter with every one of them and they were tickle layers. 



When the drones are culled out the trouble will cease as far as 

 anything that can be charged to the hens is concerned. If the nests 

 are teeming with lice or mites we cannot blame a hen for declining 

 to use them, but even when such deplorable conditions exist the 

 most persistent layers will use the nests and suffer the consequences. 

 Delaying a meal much beyond the regular time (there should be a 

 regular time) will sometimes cause hens to hold their eggs and ne- 

 glect to enter the nests in time. In such cases eggs may be drop- 

 ped at the attendant's feet when he enters the pen and the birds 

 flock around him eager for their tardy meal. Regularity in feeding 

 will prevent this. 



Constant espionage by an inexperienced and over-anxious caretaker 

 will be very likely to produce such conditions in a flock that an ab- 

 normal unrest and eagerness for food between meals will result both 

 in the laying of egg's outside of the nests and in an appearance of 

 uneasiness under restraint, with the birds in the nests. The whollv 

 mistaken notion that a hen should be, or always desires to be re- 

 leased from the uest as soon as the egg is laid has often been 

 fostered because apparently sustained as a result of such unpractical 

 methods. The novice in poultry keeping is by no means the only 

 offender in this respect. The trap nest novice is. 



If reasonable confinement in trap nests is likely to injure our birds 

 in any way then let us cease to impose the much greater restraint 

 made necessary by our methods of caring for brood hens, breeding 

 males, exhibition and market birds, and expensive specimens shipped 

 to fastidious customers. Preconceived notions are not always con- 

 sistent or sane. 



When an adequate equipment of Ideal nests is provided and the 

 flock properly fed and cared' for and eggs are found outside of the 

 nests, the presence of drones that should lie weeded out mav be 

 suspected. 



It may be regarded as reasonably sure that such birds as have a 

 place in the e>i;^ record are not guilty. That will confine the sus- 

 pects to those birds thai do not appear in the daily records. This 

 fact being recognized it will simplify the matter of detecting the 

 offenders. A little watching will generally result in catching the 

 bird or birds in the act and a note can be made of them. 



When eggs are found in some corner or secluded spot where the hen 

 has made a nest for herself, an Ideal nest box should be put in (hat place 

 or as near it as possible. I have found that by (his means (lie hen or 

 pullet was invariably caught, and after using (he nest once or twice 

 would continue to lav either in the same nest or in Hie others. 



