198 



On the Rearing and Management of Poultry. 



The following is the weekly consumption of food^ and the 

 average produce of eggs, of four hens of the Dutch everj-day 

 laying variety : — 



s. d. 



1*4 gallons of barley at 205. per quarter ..06 

 26 eggs at Is. per score 1 3" 6 



Profit 0 9-6 



— being upwards of 150 per cent. The consumption of food in 

 this case is very great, being \^d. each per week. We are at 

 present trying experiments with the Spanish breed; we find 

 that three hens and a cock consume in a week 



d. 



gallon of oats at 14s. per quarter . . . 1-3125 

 i stone of barley-meal at M. per stone . . 4' 



5-3125 



or rather more than \\d. each per week. If the fowls had a free 

 range we would calculate on keeping them on one-fourth of this 

 amount. 



Different kinds of Food. — The principal food of poultry, more 

 especially fowls, turkeys, and the guinea-fowl, consists of grain, 

 grass, and vegetables of the garden, including potatoes and 

 turnips, and also of oatmeal, barley-meal, mill-sweepings, and 

 pollen, made into a sort of thick porridge, and a variety of other 

 things, such as oil-cake, broken meat, fish, animal offal (liquid 

 or solid), liver, greaves, the refuse of the distiller, brewer, 

 sugar refiner, and baker, the kernel of the coco-nut, &c. As not 

 one farmer in five hundred can come at many of the things we 

 have named, we must look to the direct produce of the farm for 

 the supply of food. 



Some recommend the grain to be boiled ; but nature has so 

 constructed the feathered tribe as to render this unnecessary; 

 and as the nutritious property of the grain is not increased by 

 boiling, no advantage is gained. (As a change we sometimes 

 give it to fowls in coops.) Wheat, unless of the worst sort, is 

 too valuable to be given to poultry. Rye is not much relished ; 

 in fact, after a few feeds, fowls will scarcely look at it. 



Oats and barley are the best sorts of grain for the purpose of 

 feeding poultry. Potatoes should be boiled or steamed (we give 

 preference to the latter). Turnips must either be sliced or 

 boiled, and mixed with pollen or barley-meal. Fowls are ex- 

 ceedingly fond of the young shoots of turnips, especially at the 

 present season. 



Feeding and Fattening. — I have reserved my remarks on 

 feeding and fattening until I have described the rearing and 

 management of all the varieties of poultry. 



