Bad M an age men t on Farms. 
103 
every one of our correspondents who himself knows anything about poultry, is most emphatic. 
One who is at present largely in the duck-fattening business near Leighton Buzzard, and has from 
8,000 to 10,000 ducklings in his pens at one time, writes : “ Farmers have little respect for poultry. 
In the first place, they keep them badly ; and secondly, they have bred them from the same stock 
for yeais, and had the hen-houses since their great-grandfather was a boy, sometimes only cleaned 
out once 01 twice since , and, as a lule, they only remove the dung once or twice a year, at turnip- 
sowing time. I used to do a bit of egg-collecting myself, and send to London, but gave it up, as I 
had too many other 110ns in the fire, and was afraid some of them would burn ; I used to supply the 
Langham Hotel, for one. I found farmers' eggs only came twice in the year, and that was when 
the grass began to grow in the spring, and when they had been harvesting. I used to find my 
winter eggs at cottages, where they kept from six to twenty hens and fed them pretty well.” 
Another correspondent at Liskeard writes : “ There is little consideration given to poultry. It is 
not regarded as a source of income, but as a mere household convenience, consequently little 
provision made for it. Poultry-houses are exceptions, the birds having generally to find their 
roosts in cart-sheds or trees, and they lay about in the cattle-sheds and hedges, where their eggs 
have to be hunted up. A large quantity die yearly from want of care, and foxes have more than 
their share owing to the exposed character of the roosts.” That is the evidence of a practical man, 
who adds, that amongst cottagers in the same district he finds fowls now generally kept in place 
of a pig, as formerly, as they have found them pay better. Another at Whitby writes : “ Poultry 
is left in the care of the women, the farmer looking vvith contempt on them. No care is taken of 
the strain, the birds run about anyhow, eggs are set indiscriminately, and winter eggs are almost 
unknown in consequence, while old birds are kept on to almost fabulous ages. I hardly know one 
farmer here who would spend five shillings in material or a day’s labour in any way to make 
a better start. Every one has eggs when they are so cheap, nobody has eggs or chickens when 
prices are good, and I fear the present generation is too old to be taught.” Another at Warring- 
ton says : “ The breeds are nondescript, the accommodation totally inadequate, the feeding generally 
nil. Until this year I never in this neighbourhood saw a brood of chickens in March.” \ et the 
cottagers do well, and this same correspondent reports one of them as making 10s. per week in 
1886 out of his fowls ! 
The causes of all this are twofold. There is first the fact that, from a time when other things 
were far more profitable, a few fowls were simply kept for the house, and left to the women, so that 
the farmer never knew anything about them ; and secondly, the consequent looted belief that theie 
is “ no money in them.” We have many replies to the effect that poultiy aic believed to pay so 
long as only kept in numbers to eat what would otherwise be wasted, but not more.” Would any 
stock pay , treated as they have been? Would dairy cattle “pay if left to bleed togethci 
indiscriminately at any time of year, mating left to chance, half the milk lost or stolen, and no 
food but what was “ waste ” otherwise? On an average one-third of the eggs laid on a faim aie 
lost, and another third stolen, and because the hens do not “ pay ” so, they are condemned. Briefly, 
the main root of the mischief lies in the fact that farmers do not systematically either (1) breed, 
(2) feed, or (3) collect the produce of their fowls. Where this is done, poultry kept with judgment 
is, wherever the produce can be sold, the most profitable of all stock on the farm. 01 this there 
is abundant evidence of the most practical kind. . 
One of our correspondents, who in filling up one of the returns stated that poultry-farming 
in his district was “simply awful,” states of himself: “For the last five years I have been m 
business and have not room or time to keep much poultry; pnor to that tune I used to keep 
a large quantity on my farm, and found them to pay well with a little attention. I, had the 
