THE SOCIETY’S OSTRICHES. 
173 
It has been found by growers at the Cape that the 
plucking of the feathers permanently interferes with the 
growth of the ensuing crop, decreasing the quantity and 
injuring the quality, and that eventually many of the birds 
become utterly useless except for breeding purposes ; and 
we have now before us an extract from the letter of a well- 
known ostrich farmer at the Cape published in the Graaf 
Reinet Advertiser , in which he says, “ I most certainly 
advocate the clipping of feathers at seven months, after the 
stumps have been pulled out. When I have clipped the 
feathers I leave the stumps in for four months until they are 
thoroughly ripe, which brings the stump to eleven months, 
when it will be found to come out quite easy, without 
hurting the birds. In fact some of them are then already 
falling out.” He also says, “ In the pulling process the 
holes get filled up with congealed blood, and the succeeding 
crop of feathers having to find its way through a socket 
of the wing with hard blood in it, is much injured.” And 
“I have bought birds that I knew to have been pulled 
every six months. But buying them for breeding purposes 
I was not particular as to their being spoilt. I knew 
them to have been good birds. They were utterly spoilt. 
One hen for three years only yielded four or five feathers 
in each wing. The rest were mere little sinews. The one 
cock bird had about ten feathers, nor did he produce any 
more for a full year. These birds I left in their breeding 
camps, and after waiting as above the feathers started. 
I pursued my plan of clipping and they now yield me as 
good a crop of feathers as could be wished.” “ Brom this 
it seems pretty certain that not only is the clipping process 
less cruel than that of pulling, but in the end is more con- 
ducive to the well-being and productiveness of the bird. 
This being so, we can hardly believe that ostrich farmers 
generally will continue a practice that is in itself cruel, 
