874 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
June 27, 
The Henyard. 
Trapping Troublesome Pigeons. 
I NOTICED an inquiry from someone 
troubled by stray pigeons that come 
to his place and annoy him in several 
ways, but it has been about impossible 
to get rid of them by any known means. 
Poisoning has been suggested, and while 
this might be effective in some degree 
it would be very dangerous, for the poi¬ 
soned food would be carried by sparrows 
or in some other way get where poultry 
or other useful birds or animals would 
get it and be killed. There need be but 
little trouble to catch the pigeons by 
trapping them in two ways, as I know 
by experience, for my son once kept 
pigeons and was troubled with strays eat¬ 
ing the feed he had for his own. The 
strays will very readily go into any 
place where feed is put that they can 
enter and nest boxes are especially at¬ 
tractive to them. If the person being 
bothered will fix almost any kind of box 
or boxes and place them bottom upwards 
where they will look homelike to the 
pigeons, he can catch them easily. They 
may be fed in these inverted boxes or 
houses and even allowed to begin to build 
nests if they stay open lon 0 - enough. The 
trapping is the easiest sort of thing. Make 
a swinging wire door, hinged at the top, 
to put just inside each opening by bend¬ 
ing it like the letter “u” only with square 
instead of rounded corners. The length 
of the bent wire should be a little more 
than the height of the opening to be shut. 
Two small staples are driven over the 
wire door near the corners, which serve 
as hinges as well as to hold it in an 
inverted position. To the pigeons it looks 
very open, as it really is so far as going 
in is concerned, but in trying to come out 
the ends of the wire touched the floor 
of the box, and being near enough to¬ 
gether to prevent the birds from passing 
between them, the trap is complete. It 
is then an easy matter to get the pigeons 
out and kill them. They are good to eat 
and put to this use they will pay well 
for the trouble of catching them. 
Another kind of trap may be made by 
setting a big sieve or any sort of wire 
or slat covered box, inverted, and a stick 
with a string tied to it under one edge 
as a trigger. This should be set and 
baited with wheat or anything that pig¬ 
eons like and allow them to come under 
the trap and eat and go out until they 
get familiar with it. Then bait well and 
hold the farther end of the string at 
some hidden place from which it can 
be pulled and the birds caught. The 
boys can have considerable fun and then 
all enjoy pigeon pot-pie. 
n. E. VAN DEMAN. 
Trouble With Chicks. 
What is the matter with my young 
chicks? I had 125 chicks hatch 
out from the incubator; when they 
hatched they were very thrifty, but the 
chicks have been dying ever since. They 
seem to feel good till a couple of hours 
before they die, their eyes seem to swell 
and go shut so they cannot see. The 
throat seems to fill up and they cannot 
get their breath. Some of our laying 
hens’ throats seem to fill up, but they 
seem to choke it down, only one laying 
hen has died. I would like to know how 
to care for young chicks and feed them 
after they come from the incubator. 
Michigan. R. L. M. 
Young chicks are subject to catarrhal 
inflammation of the eyes, due to exposure 
to cold, dampness, irritation from strong 
fumes, etc., and it may be that one of 
these conditions or a roupy infection from 
exposure to older fowls with a similar 
disease is responsible for the trouble in 
your flock ; without knowing just the con¬ 
ditions under which they are kept it is 
impossible to say positively. As a mat¬ 
ter of precaution against contagion young 
chicks should be kept away from older 
fowls and the quarters in which they are 
kept should be thoroughly cleaned and 
disinfected if they have previously been 
occupied by other fowls. Previously used 
drinking fountains, feed dishes, etc., 
should always be thoroughly scalded with 
foiling water before being placed before 
young chicks. 
Do not feed chicks anything for from 
24 to 3G hours after hatching; they need 
this time in which to absorb the un¬ 
digested yolk still remaining within their 
bodies. For the first feed give stale bread 
crumbs which may be dipped into milk 
and squeezed dry, oat flakes, crumbled 
johnny cake made from eornmeal, a little 
fine chick grit and fresh water. This 
diet will do for a couide of days, during 
which time they should be fed five times 
daily, giving them only as much as they 
will quickly clean up. Then put them oil 
the regular chick grain composed of pin¬ 
head oat meal, one part; finely cracked 
corn, two parts; and cracked wheat, 
three parts; the “One, two, three” mix¬ 
ture, or use one of the commercial chick 
foods, if preferred. Feed this twice 
daily and in addition keep before them, 
in a shallow box, a dry mash composed 
of equal parts by weight of eornmeal. 
wheat middlings, wheat bran, and sifted 
beef scrap. This mash may also be fed 
moistened with skim-milk two or three 
times daily in addition to the chick grain; 
some flocks of young chicks eat so much 
of the mash dry that little need be fed in 
a moist condition, others need more moist¬ 
ened food. Dry food is the safest and 
care should be taken not to overfeed upon 
wet mashes. As chicks increase in age 
the number of daily meals may be de¬ 
creased and if they are upon range the 
dry mash and grain mixtures, consisting 
chiefly, or wholly, of cracked corn and 
wheat, may be kept always before them 
in hoppers. See that chicks at all ages 
have grit of suitable size and water al¬ 
ways before them; crushed charcoal and 
oyster shell should also be available. 
M. B. D. 
Deficient Vigor. 
I bought 15 day-old chicks hatched in 
an incubator three weeks ago, and put 
them with a hen. They did very nicely 
until a week ago. I noticed that one or 
two slept a great deal. I took one in and 
washed its eyes. I found some small 
dark brown spots on the eyelid, they 
were hard and all washed off and have 
not come back on that chicken, but the 
chicken sleeps just the same. More have 
the spots on the eyelids and their bills 
are dark next their combs. They eat 
well and do not look sickly. They have 
bread crumbs, sour milk, baby chick food 
as dry mash, fine ground grains. 
Massachusetts. e. e. s. 
Your description does not indicate any 
serious trouble with the eyes, but rather 
a lack of vigor which may have one of 
several causes and which makes the 
chicks sleepy and stupid. Lice or mites 
from the lien or from the nesting ma¬ 
terials may be sapping the strength of 
the chicks. Examine the hen and chicks 
carefully and if any lice are found dust 
the hen thoroughly with a good lice pow¬ 
der and grease the chicks under the wings 
and on the head with a little lard or vase¬ 
line; repeat after a few days. See that 
the hen does not brood her chicks in 
dirty quarters where mites may abound. 
It is safe to assume that all hens are 
lousy; unless they have been specially 
and carefully treated, they are; and then 
they probably are. Some chicks are born 
with so little vitality that they succumb 
to bowel troubles of some nature after 
they reach the age of one to two weeks 
or a little more. Others may die at any 
age without showing evidences of serious 
bowel troubles though digestive disturb¬ 
ances may be present. The trouble here 
is apt to lie with the breeding stock and 
it is too late to remedy it after the chicks 
are hatched. Deficient vigor from arti¬ 
ficial hatching is also probably responsi¬ 
ble for many of the deaths of young 
chicks in which no definite disease can 
be found. There must, of course, be 
some definite cause for a death but behind 
this cause may he a weak organism un¬ 
able to cope successfully with the ordin¬ 
ary ills of chickhood. M. B. D. 
Hen Lice. 
1. What can I use on hen lice? They 
are a light red, quite large. I also have 
trouble with a large louse on the chick¬ 
ens’ heads; have used sulphur, lard and 
coal oil on them. 2. A large Plymouth 
Dock hen has a sore on lower part of 
body. What can I do for it? w. c. H. 
Angola, N. Y. 
The red lice that you see are probably 
red mites which are red only when gorged 
with their victims’ blood. They seldom 
stay upon the fowls during the day but 
may be found in the cracks about the 
perches, nests and other places where the 
hens resort. To destroy them paint or 
spray all these places with kerosene or 
crude oil to which has been added one 
fourth part of crude carbolic acid. Search 
out all their hiding places behind nests, 
under perches, etc.; if you have never 
looked for them, a little close investiga¬ 
tion will probably surprise you. Ilead 
lice may be killed by any grease but the 
addition of one-fourth part of blue oint¬ 
ment will add to the effectiveness of the 
ointment. 2. Treat the sore of which 
you speak with carbolized vaseline in 5% 
strength. 
“The Business Hen,” published by the 
Rural Publishing Co., has a chapter on 
the diseases of poultry, and is a good 
treatise on their general care. Farmers’ 
Bulletin No. 530 from the TJ. S. Depart¬ 
ment of Agriculture, Washington, D. C.. 
also treats of the common diseases of 
poultry and may be had upon application 
without charge. m. b. d. 
Possible Limberneck, 
I have a hen which had been sitting 
about 10 days when she developed some¬ 
thing like limberneck. She has her head 
under her breast continuously, and does 
not care to eat anything. Give possible 
cause and remedy. j. d. ir. 
Kingston, N. Y. 
I hardly think that this is a case of 
limberneck though I cannot say what it 
is. If the hen appears sick, give her a 
good big teaspoonful of castor oil. being 
sure to get more of it on the inside of 
her neck than on the outside, and if she 
has no fatal disease, she will probably 
respond to the treatment. M. B. D. 
When you write advertisers mention 
Tiie R. N.-Y. and you'll get a quick 
reply and a “square deal.” See guaran¬ 
tee editorial page. : : : : 
Tramp Hens. 
I notice that you publish only one side 
of the damage by hens story. I believe 
that the damage, bad as it is. is caused 
by comparatively a few hens, and that if 
those who are troubled with the neigh¬ 
bors’ hens would build trap coops to 
catch the hens that did the damage, the 
owners would be glad to sell them. When 
you ask a man to shut up 200 hens be¬ 
cause. a half dozen are getting over the 
line fence, well, he doesn’t do it. 
Skaneateles, N. Y. w. P. 
R. N.-Y.—But why should he not be 
compelled to do so? Why must the man 
who suffers the loss be compelled to trap 
out the culprits in the flock? If a man 
keeps 100 hens and six of them do the 
damage, he should either select out the 
six himself or keep the 100 shut up. 
Infertile Turkey Eggs. 
Last Spring I bought two White Hol¬ 
land hen turkeys and a tom, claimed not 
to be related. They were hatched the 
first of last August. They were nice 
well-grown turkeys for their age. They 
mated well and began laying about the 
first of April. I took good care of the 
eggs, kept them in a box of wheat bran 
and turned them every day until I had 
2S and then I set them. Not one of the 
eggs proved to be fertile. I would like 
to know the reason. Is the fault in me, 
or the turkeys, or the one who sold me 
the turkeys? F. c. K. 
New York. 
I cannot be positive as to the cause of 
the infertility of these eggs, but am in¬ 
clined to lay it to the immaturity of all 
the turkeys concerned; it is possible, of 
course, that the male bird alone is at 
fault and should be discarded. Turkeys 
used in the breeding pen should all be 
at least one year old and well developed, 
vigorous, specimens; the hazards of tur¬ 
key raising are too great, at best, to justi¬ 
fy the use of immature parent stock. If 
another, and older, tom cannot be pro¬ 
cured, it may be possible to take the hens 
to a neighbor’s flock and allow them to 
run with it for a few days. One mating 
of turkeys is sufficient as a rule for the 
season. m. b. d. 
More About Line Breeding. 
On page 241 there is a chart of line¬ 
breeding from Feleh. I am breeding for 
the male characteristics. I bred A plus 
B equals O, then C plus A equals D, then 
D plus A equals E. Am I right? Then 
if I get new blood from the same breed¬ 
er that I got the first males from, shall 
I be line-breeding? For illustrate, I got 
a cock which equals A; then if I send 
to same breeder and get eggs and raise 
males and breed them to E, will that he 
line-breeding, and is that the proper place 
at which to introduce fresh blood? 
Should I introduce fresh blood next at G? 
Groton, N. Y. n. e. k. 
You are right, and when you get “E,” 
which you may call a combination of 
daughter and great granddaughter, you 
have a fowl, or several fowls, containing 
seven-eighths of the blood of “A,” whose 
blood you wished to perpetuate and in¬ 
tensify in his descendents. You may 
continue to line-breed according to the 
chart until you get “G” with 27-32 of 
the blood of “A,” in other words, you 
have almost reproduced the original 
male “A,” so far as blood goes. If, how¬ 
ever, you mate “G” with some more or 
less distant relatives from the same 
breeder, you stop line-breeding from “A” 
and commence simply to inbreed or breed 
together closely related animals. In do¬ 
ing this you maintain the strain pure, 
but begin to dilute the blood of “A” in 
his descendents. This is proper if you 
wish to do it, as it is to be assumed that 
your original cock “A” was of such 
superiority that you wished to perpetuate 
his blood for breeding purposes. This 
form of line-breeding is close inbreeding 
and will perpetuate and intensify “A’s” 
defects as well as his good qualities, and 
unless you select and cull “A’s” progeny 
rigidly, you may find that “G” is an in¬ 
ferior specimen that should find no place 
in a breeding pen. There is no particu¬ 
lar place at which fresh blood should be 
introduced; you may cross any of “A’s” 
progeny with other fowls of the same 
strain, but the further you line-breed 
from “A,” the more of his blood you 
will have in your new mating. I have 
used the terms line-breeding and inbreed¬ 
ing here as they are used in the chart, 
but it is only proper to say that you will 
find this meaning of these terms reversed 
by some writers upon animal breeding. 
M. B. D. 
Depluming Mite*. 
" - > 
Dune Alpin Heavy Laying 
S. C. White Leghorns 
have won more firsts, specials and other 
awards in the last four years at New York, 
Boston, Hagerstown and Philadelphia than 
all our competitors combined. 
HATCHING EGGS OH HAY OT.H CHICKS 
PRICES LOW, QUALITY CONSIDERED 
Send for catalogue. 
DUNE ALPIN POULTRY FARM 
Easthampton, L. I., N. Y. 
*—■ — - - .-■ -. 11 —————— ^ 
TOM BARRON 
Euglisli Logliorns 
CHCDm,X jJS—F rom our 
best trap-nested females, full blood Tom Barron 
Cockerels, (200 egg, or more progeny.) These 
will furnish you with tile best utility blood for 
breeding purposes at a very small cost. We are 
booking orders for the above to bo delivered in 
July. Weight 2 to Wh lbs. according to size, the 
least of which will value $5 at maturity. 
Send small deposit with order 
FOLSOM POULTRY FARM, Folsom, N. J: 
TOM BARRON’S 
ENGLISH 
WHITE LEGHORNS 
Special for June —Eggs $5 per 100 
Imported direct from Tom Barron’s Farm. Trap- 
nested stock. 280-egg strain. The greatest laying 
strain in the world. Eggs, $1 per set: $5 per 100. 
P. F. RAFFERTY, - Marlboro, Mass. 
MATTITUCK WHITE LEGHORN FARM 
CHICKS 
GIVE SATISFACTION. TRY THEM. PRICES 
NOW, FOR IMMEDIATE DELIVERY 
April hatched pullets.6Pc each 
Young's strain.$ 9 per 100 
Young's & Barron’s cross .10 per 100 
Safe delivery guaranteed. Catalogue free. 
A. H. PENNY, - Mattituck, New York 
Single Comb White Leghorns Exciusiteij 
D.W. Young’s strain. The finest in the world. Bred 
or their great Winter-laying qualities. Over 2000 
layers on free farm range. Largest plant of high- 
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Eggs for hatching now ready in any quantity @ $6 
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that live. My book— Profits in Poultry Keeping Solved— 
6th edition, given free with all $10 orders. Satis¬ 
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EDGAR IS BIGGS, Box 141, IMcuxnnt Valley, N.Y. 
TOM BARRON’S 
283-082-200-048 
EGG STRAINS ARE AT 
MORRIS-FARM, R.4,Bridgeport,Conn. 
BARRON LEGHORNS and BARRON WTAN00TTES, BUFF ROCKS, 
VIBERT-AUSTIN REDS. DUCKS. GEESE, HALF-BARRON LEGHORNS— 
A 200-EGG BIRO. RE0UCE0 SUMMER PRICES 
The Greatest Layers in America 
MAY anil IIINP nre pre-eminently tlio months that 
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is wise to have hatches late, as the late season makes May 
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offer special our Black Beauty Minorcas, only $1.30 per 
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all big shows. Wo ship in safe box, Express paid. Poultry 
idvloe mailed free. Send orders at once. Telegraph of¬ 
fice at Montgomery. Letters answered by return mail. W. 
L. Burnett, Prop., Coldanham Poultry lards, .Montgomery, N. T. 
S. C. W. Leghorn Chicks & Eggs 
Purebred, large, vigorous, true Leghorn tvpe. Seven 
years’ experience. Not how many, but how good 
Circular. VANCREST POULTRY FARM, Salt Point. New York 
CHICKS 
8c. c - °- D - s - w - 
Leghorns. Money 
hack for dead ones. Pam¬ 
phlet free. O.M. I.AUVKR 
liox 73, Richfield, I’a. 
LINCOLN’S LEGHORNS 
Growing S. O. W. Leghorn Cockerels for sale. 
FRANCIS F. LINCOLN, Mt. Carmel, Conn. 
P OULTRTMEN, ATTENTION—THE LAYING CONTEST proves our 8. C.W. 
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with ordor; safe delivery guaranteed. A. B. HALL, Wallingford, Conn. 
S. C. W. Leghorn Chicks 
Tom Barron and other heavy laying blood. W. Rock 
and W. W. Pullets for sale. John Lorton Lee, Carmel, N.Y 
WHITE LEGHORN CHICKS ANI) EGGS 
healthy business kind including Barron'* strain 
that grow great layers, delivery guaranteed. For 
Circular write, HAMILTON FARM, Huntington, New York 
MAPLE COVE POULTRY YARDS^*^ 
try; 200-egg strain: breeders and eggs. Send 2-cent 
stamp for Illustrated catalogue. Route 24, Athens, Pa. 
60 Varieties SR 
DUCKS. GEESE, TURKEYS- 
GUINEAS and HARES. Stock and eggs. GO 
page catalogue free. H.A. SOUDER, Box 29,Sellersville. Pa. 
Pearl Guinea Egfgs TH, J T « F,VE 
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Can you give me a practical remedy 
for depluming mite on hens and also 
how to apply it? h. g. l. 
Massachusetts. 
A little grease of any kind well rubbed 
into the skin of the affected parts will 
kill these mites and permit now feathers 
to grow. The addition of one-fourth its 
bulk of blue, or mercurial, ointment will 
add to the effectiveness of the lard or 
other grease used. m. b. d. 
ANCE lfl sALE Efl o R F S. C. Buff Orpington Breeder* 
including leading pen this variety at second Inter¬ 
national Egg-Laying Contest. 
CHERRY LANE FARM CO.. (Desk 0). Oak Hill, West Virgin'll 
KhSWJffi PARTRIDGES I PHEASANTS 
Capercailzies. Black Game, Wild Turkeys, Quails, 
Rabbits, Deer, etc., fer stocking purposes. Fancy 
Pheasants, Peafowl, Cranes, Storks. Beautiful 
Swans, Ornamental Geese and Ducks, Foxes, 
Squirrels, Ferrets, and all kinds of birds and 
animals. AV'IH. J. MACKENSKN. Natural¬ 
ist, Department lo, Yardley, l*a. 
