PHEASANT RAISING IN THE UNITED STATES. 31 
can be obtained throughout the season it is better not to use them 
at all, as chicks will reject other food after having been fed on them. 
Meal worms are very satisfactory, but are difficult to raise in suffi¬ 
cient quantity. Maggots are equally good, and enough can be pro¬ 
duced cheaply. The customary method is to suspend a piece of 
meat, or the carcass of a dead animal, over a barrel or tub of bran. 
The flesh becomes flyblown and the maggots drop into the bran. 
Before they are used the maggots must be thoroughly cleansed or 
they are apt to cause purging. This is usually done by putting 
burlap or very fine mesh wire in place of the bottom of the barrel or 
box of bran. They will work their way down through the bran in 
search of food and may be caught in a receptacle below, all ready for 
feeding to the pheasants. This method is very offensive, and may 
be replaced by permitting a carcass to become flyblown and then 
Fig. 17.—Coop used on an Illinois pheasantry. 
burying it a few inches in the ground; the maggots will work their way 
to the surface, where they can be secured by the young pheasants. 
The Massachusetts Game Commission found sheep plucks the cheap¬ 
est and most available material for producing maggots. Thirty-six 
plucks a week produce enough food for 200 young pheasants—36 to 
48 quarts of maggots. Three times a week plucks were allowed to 
become flyblown, when they were taken into a small shed built for 
the purpose and hung on meat hooks. In about twenty-four hours 
the maggots dropped into boxes below containing 1 quart of ground 
beef scraps to 6 quarts of bran. They then dropped through the 
quarter-inch mesh wire cloth, of which the bottoms of the boxes were 
composed, into especially designed drawers. In four or five days 
after the meat was blown the maggots were fit for pheasant food. 
If not used within a few hours the maggots change into the chrysa- 
390 
