The Breeding 
of Canaries. 
THE BIRD WORLD. 
( I 59) 
What April Brings. 
Now, we’ll say this happened on the first of 
April. The second of the month will see another 
•egg. Do the same thing - with this second egg 
as you did with the first. Put it away safely. 
One dummy egg will do in the nest. Do the 
same on the third morning. Lift down the nest, 
but instead of taking away the newly-laid egg 
replace the other two, dust the nest over with a. 
good shake of insect powder, and put it back. 
Remember the date, jot it down somewhere, and 
wait patiently. Do not let anyone disturb the 
birds at this time. Feed them yourself, with 
nothing but plain seed and clean water. Give a 
bath now pretty nearly every day if the weather 
is very dry ancf hot. Have no fear but what 
the chicks will be there in good time. But look 
here, Frankie, let Norah understand that the 
room the cage is in is forbidden ground to her. 
Girls are so inquisitive, and so are boys, so re¬ 
member. On the thirteenth morning, counting 
from the day you replaced the eggs and set the 
hen, a little egg food is good to place in the 
^age. A finger-pan or a small drawer-pan will 
suit. 
The Making of Egg Food. 
The egg food is easily made, but there is nice 
•egg food and nasty egg food, and I daresay the 
birds know good from bad. Fancy goes a long 
way with birds as well as with human creatures. 
Boil an egg very hard, take a slice of bread and 
grate it nicely with a grater, throw away the 
crust and any lumps, rub the egg in the same 
way, add a little sugar, mix all together lightly, 
and there you are. Simple, eh, Frankie? Try 
it. Good stuff comes nice and crumbly, bad stuff 
is sloppy and sticky, the result usually of the egg 
not being hard enough. Well-made egg food 
can be relished by anybody, yourself included, 
and ought to almost rear chicks simply by the 
smell. 
The Time of Hatching. 
The fateful morning comes. Don’t get up too 
early, Frankie. If at the usual breakfast-time you 
can’t hear anything strange in the cage, such as 
the strange sounds a newly-hatched chick makes, 
take down the nest-pan. Ease the hen gently 
off and peep. Ah, a little hairy thing ! That’s 
enough. You’ve got chicks at last, Frankie. 
Never mind if all the eggs have hatched or not. 
Come away. Give your egg food, clean water, 
and fresh seed, and don’t hang about. The hen 
can’t keep an eye on you and feed her chicks at 
the same time. 
Early Treatment of the Young. 
When the young are two or three days old 
take some hemp seed, run a bottle or your 
mother’s rolling-pin over it, and crush it, not 
Into paste, but so that the seed husks are easily 
broken. This is a grand thing for young chicks, 
Frankie, and yours will grow up strong and 
lusty if hemp seed, egg food, and nice, fresh 
green food is given, often, but sparingly. Fresh 
and sweet every time should be your motto, my 
boy. 
As They Advance. 
About three weeks old young Canaries are 
nicely feathered. This is the time when you 
must not take any liberties, such as taking down 
the nest to show people and all that sort of 
thing. If disturbed the youngsters will leave 
the nest and refuse to go back. Then you’ll be 
worried when, after a frantic flutter, you see 
your precious chicks crouching in corners or 
trying to get through the wires. Once out of 
the nest you never get them back again. I have 
stood for nearly half an hour myself, hand on 
nest, keeping down a lot of chicks, but all to no 
good. Everything smooth going, however, sees 
your chicks out of the nest about three weeks 
or a month old. 
Cleanse With Fire. 
Once the nest is forsaken, take it away. Burn 
the felt lining and bake the pan in the kitchen 
oven. I have refrained from telling you about 
red-mite, for I think we all get red-mite on the 
brain. You will have reared a few score red- 
mite as well as a few chicks, and you must get 
a firm hold over them. If you see them at all 
in any numbers have a small brush soaked in 
paraffin and dose them. I have tried red-mite 
with it, and at times I have seen them take all 
the oil I could give them and be lusty at the end. 
I intend to try cedar oil myself this year, but I 
fancy nothing can keep them away altogether. 
They must be killed and fought against continu¬ 
ally. Always war to the death. 
The Second Family. 
Once the chicks are free of the nest, place 
them in the second partition of the cage, slip 
in the wire slide, and scatter a handful of sand 
on the floor of the cage. Crush some Canary 
seed and throw that on the sand, and put in a 
dish of egg food as well. Keep the old birds 
supplied with egg food as well, and watch for the 
young chicks to pick on their own. When a 
month or five weeks old they can be taken away. 
The hen will probably refuse to feed them through 
the wires of the slide. About the sixth week 
from the start you can safely put in another 
nest-pan and go ahead for the second round. 
Give a pinch of maw seed to the youngsters now 
and then, but no greenstuff. 
I fancy that covers everything, Frankie. 
Patience and carefulness is the best I can say. 
Patience and no undue interference make good 
results. 
Your loving Uncle, 
A. McInnes. 
