Artificial Feeding. 
4i 
occasions, which the fancier can only ascertain by carefully watching his birds. Sometimes a pair 
of strong young ones will take all the soft food from the parents in a very few days ; when they 
fall off and become so weak for want of it, that the parents hardly attempt to feed them at all. 
In all such cases the young should have their crops filled every night with the artificial soft food, 
when they will soon become stronger, and the old ones will take to feeding them again. Directly 
they do this the artificial food may be left off. Later on, say at about three weeks old, when the 
soft food is entirely gone, and the old birds give the young ones nothing but grain which has been 
soaked in their crops, it will often happen that the crops of the young are badly filled at night ; 
in which case the young birds should be crammed every night till the crops are tolerably full with 
the soaked grain as before directed, always putting this into warm water before administering. 
Such treatment will keep the young ones from falling off in condition. Again, it frequently 
happens that one of the two young ones — usually a hen, as we stated a little while back — is a 
great deal larger than the other, especially if the first egg has not been taken from the hen as 
advised by us. If the difference is great, the strong bird is apt to get the lion’s share of the 
food, being more clamorous; and hence the little one dwindles still more, and ultimately perishes. 
But if in such cases the small one gets a few nights of this cramming — soft or hard according 
to its age — it will grow rapidly till both are equal in size ; and thus two fine birds may be reared 
instead of one. 
All such operations should be performed with especial care not to frighten the old birds. 
If these are disturbed carelessly at night, the hen is apt, if wild, and especially if a Carrier, to fly 
off, and not go on the birds again for hours. When such a case occurs, the hen should be caught 
in the dark, and replaced gently in the nest-pan ; but to avoid it, the light should be kept at a 
good distance, and the hand, well warmed , gently and stealthily introduced under the bird to 
abstract her young one. The beans and peas being rather swelled, the crops are soon filled, when 
the birds should be returned in the same way. The easiest way of feeding is to put a gutta-percha 
ring, about a quarter of an inch aperture and the same in thickness, over the point of the upper 
mandible, which serves as a gag to keep it open, when the peas and beans are easily slipped in the 
opening behind. Many fanciers put the beans in the mouth, and put the beaks of the young ones 
to it, which is a very easy plan. Some folks would perhaps shudder at this, but for our part we 
cannot see that there is anything about it more offensive than a young lady teaching a pet canary 
to take food from between her pretty lips. However, it is perfectly optional either way, and we 
are not ashamed to say we have reared plenty of birds by both the methods we have described. 
Another useful plan we have often employed, when the old birds did not appear to feed their 
young sufficiently, and these were accordingly ceasing to make satisfactory progress, is to give the 
old birds a good feed of rice boiled in milk in the evening. At first there is often a little difficulty 
in getting them to eat it ; but once this is got over they are inordinately fond of it, and will eat 
such a quantity as to ensure their young ones a plentiful supply. Oatmeal cake broken into 
small pieces is also good for them. We have seen a marvellous difference worked in a few days 
by this method ; but it is only suitable when the food of the old birds only partially fails, and 
cannot be depended upon altogether. Such expedients are also useless in the case of birds — 
such as high-class Barbs — the conformation of whose beaks places mechanical difficulties in the way 
of feeding their young after a certain age. 
As soon as the young birds are able to leave the nest we have described, they will usually 
be able to peck for themselves. Whether they want food given to them, besides what they pick 
up or obtain from their parents, must be ascertained by feeling their crops at night. These ought 
to be fairly full of grain, and should be filled artificially if needed ; but by degrees less and less 
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