12 PHEASANT FARMING 



the bone mixture and place thin slices of fresh liver on the shorts or 

 dirt. Turn the bone mixture back on top of the slices of liver. In a 

 few hours the larvse will all leave the bone mixture and be under and 

 feeding upon the liver. After this the bone mixture should be 

 thrown away. 



In a day's time the liver will be eaten to shreds and must be 

 replaced with a fresh supply of thinly sliced liver or fresh meat, and 

 so on each day until the larvae are practically full grovro. This 

 will take practically a week's time and they may then be fed to the 

 young pheasants. The larvae must be fed on liver or meat as long as 

 they are on hand. As soon as they are matured they will descend 

 into the shorts or dirt and change into the pupa state, in which 

 condition they are equally as good for feed as when alive. In feeding 

 the liver or meat, feed only enough that they will consume it in 

 twenty-four hours' time. "The assimilating power of the larvae is so 

 great that it can change every particle of meat or liver (except 

 fibre) to larvae, consequently there can be no smell." The object in 

 cutting the liver or meat thin is that it may all be consumed before 

 having time to become tainted. Keep extra supply of liver in cool 

 place and a little charcoal such as is used to feed chickens, sprinkled 

 over and under it will tend to keep it fresh. 



In order to keep a supply of larvae, it will be necessary to put 

 out new pans of bone every few days, depending on quantity, the 

 number of pheasants you have and the state of the weather. The 

 warmer the weather the more rapid the development of the larvae. 

 If you contemplate using larvae, you should start with the bone 

 mixture a week prior to date of first hatching. 



The advantage of this food is that you need not hesitate to feed 

 young birds all they will eat. They are wild for it and will frequently 

 crowd their crops and throats to overflowing with no apparent bad 

 results. They thrive better on this food than on anything else. Other 

 methods may be employed to produce the larvae but it should be 

 remembered that but fifteen days' time elapses from the laying of the 

 fly egg until it has successfully become larvae, entered the pupa stite 

 and turned into a fly again, that the larvae are clean feeders and 

 that they must have a medium (shorts, or clean fine dirt preferably) 

 in which to bury themselves. When about ten days old they pass into 

 the pupa state, in which form they may be kept if stored at a low 

 temperature (40 degrees F.) The low temperature stops the de- 

 velopment. 



Every one is familiar with the history of the butterfly, bow an 

 ugly worm dries up in the fall of the year and in sprmgxime breaks 

 open to release a beautiful butterfly. This dried worm is the pup"i. 

 and just as the butterfly's egg dries up and later produces a perfect 

 insect, so the larvae of the common fly when grown dries up and 

 la,ter produces a fly again, only the change to the fly is accomplished 

 in a few days instead of months. 



