268 THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN, July 27, 1858. 
cause of my exemption from the numerous maladies which 
some old writers, following Mr. Moore, the father, if I may 
so call him, of English Pigeon-fanciers, have enumerated. 
When I have purchased a sick Pigeon, cleanliness and good 
living, liberty, the salt-cat, and the bath, have soon restored it 
to health. If the bird is mopish, and droops its wings, a few 
pills of butter or suet are very beneficial. Cut or broken 
| feathers I pull out at once. The longest wing or tail feathers 
are perfectly reformed in three or four weeks, and at once 
give the bird renewed powers of locomotion and additional 
clothing. 
The only disease that has troubled me, to tmy extent, has 
been canker : a cheesy-looking lump, or lumps, of pus, of very 
disgusting odour, which forms in or about the mouth, and 
which I consider highly contagious. I have sometimes bought 
the bird with it; at other times it has appeared without any 
apparent cause. I believe it arises, in the first case, from a bad 
state of the blood, and breaks out in any part wounded by 
fighting, or otherwise. It is also said to arise from their 
drinking from a tin vessel, or from dirty water. It is very 
fatal to young birds. When old birds are attacked, I remove 
the matter with a thin piece of wood, cut like a little spatula, 
and rub the place thoroughly with caustic. This must be 
done effectually at once, or it will only form again, spread 
more, and become more difficult to eradicate. I believe con¬ 
finement and want of condiments to be a common cause of 
this disease. 
I have seen cases of many other disorders, but have no 
practical knowledge of them. 
PARASITES. 
The small vermin that infest the pigeon-house and Pigeons 
are of five kinds, viz., fleas, lice, feather lice, mites, and ticks. 
Fleas are engendered by dirty, ill-kept lofts, and may 
easily be got rid of by cleanliness, brushing out the nests and 
corners, and not allowing dirt, dust, and feathers, to lay about 
or accumulate. They are much like other fleas, but smaller, 
blacker, and, though teasing, will not remain with human 
beings. 
Lice infest the bodies of the birds, breeding among the 
feathers, mostly about the head and neck, but also running 
all over the body. These usually attack sick or delicate in¬ 
dividuals ; and they may almost be considered as constitutional 
with some. They are very annoying to the poor birds, keeping 
them in low condition, and retarding their recovery. Butter, 
or lard, rubbed on the skin, is said to kill them ; but I con¬ 
sider a little powdered sulphur, dusted in among the feathers, 
the best remedy. Cleanliness and good condition are the 
best preventives. 
Feather lice differ considerably from these; they are 
elongated and flattened in form, very tough, and difficult to 
remove from the feathers between the fibres of the vanes on 
which they live. They do not appear to inconvenience the 
birds at all. Their food, I think, is the down at the quill 
end of the feathers; and it seems almost as if they were in¬ 
tended to reduce the warmth of the bird’s covering in summer; 
for their number must be very much decreased at moulting- 
time by the quantity cast off with the old feathers, and not 
until spring can they increase sufficiently to thin the warm 
under-covering of down, which in summer is not so necessary 
for the Pigeons as in the cold months of winter. 
Mites are the smallest, and by far the most troublesome, 
pests incident to Pigeons. The largest are not larger than 
grains of poppy-seed, generally black, with a white streak or 
spot. They inhabit the chinks in the walls, the cracks in the 
wood, and often congregate in thousands in the nests, whence 
they sally forth at night and attack the Pigeons : after 
their feast they appear of a red colour. "Lime-wash seems to 
have no effect on them. Mercurial ointment they appear to 
care little about. They get into the ears of the young birds, 
and torment them so much in warm weather, that they retard 
their growth, and often prove fatal,—even sometimes driving 
the old ones to forsake their eggs or young. 
I am not sure that I can offer a perfect cure for their attacks, 
but a drop of oil on the ears, under the wings, and where else 
le mites may be seen, will prevent their annoying the young 
ones. Powdered sulphur strewn in the nests, and dusted 
among the feathers of the old birds, is the best plan I know 
ol. As a preventive means, I would advise cleanliness ; stop 
all cracks and chinks, let the woodwork be planed and painted, 
and do not give the Pigeons hay for nests ; heath and birch 
twigs are the best. Washing the walls, painting the wood¬ 
work, so as to stop all cracks, however minute, and, perhaps, 
the addition of powdered sulphur in the limewash, may be a 
good precaution. I # am inclined to the opinion, that their 
attacking the ears and mouths of young Pigeons, sometimes 
induce canker in those parts. 
Ticks are the last and most disgusting parasites that attack 
Pigeons. They are also the largest and most rare. I believe 
they proceed from an ugly, curious, flat-looking fly, about the 
size of a common house-fly, of a slaty-grey colour, and very 
flat in form. In warm weather one may occasionally be seen 
skipping over the Pigeons, and quickly hiding among their 
feathers. The ticks generally fasten on the head of the bird, 
and grow as large as tares, when the feathers not being large 
enough to hide them completely, they may be picked off. I 
have not often found them on Pigeons hi this country, but 
more frequently on young sparrows. I am inclined to think 
•they do not strictly belong to Pigeons, but occur on them 
more as exceptions.— B. P. Brent. 
(To le continued.) 
OUR LETTER BOX. 
Fevered Hen.— “ If the disease in poultry which is called roup in 
England, is the same as that which is similarly named in Scotland 
the following account of a case and cure may not be without its uses 
I have a Silver-pencilled Hamburgh hen, very much prized on more 
accounts than one. She is, I believe, almost a perfect bird ; her laving 
properties are most excellent, but what, perhaps, endears her most of 
all, is the circumstance of the hen being a native of the good old city 
Pn. Li P Coln ~ a city endeared to me by many very pleasing associations, 
this hen was seized about a month ago with a kind of cough or bark 
and rattling in the throat : the people hereabouts pronounced it to 
be a case of roup. My ‘ Gardeners ’ were, unfortunately, at the 
binders, so that I could not consult that useful cyclopaedia. The case 
was urgent, and as I do not get my copy of The Cottage Gardener 
until the Friday night after publication, if I had asked advice through 
its columns, I was afraid the information would come too late. Mr. T. 
one of my advisers, removed from its tongue a thick, horny substance’ 
similar to the one herewith enclosed. It gave some little relief, but a 
week after she was as bad as ever. At length my ‘ Gardeners ’ came 
home, and after reading all that is written therein, from Dr. Horner 
downwards, I resolved to try copaiba as he suggests. I was dissuaded 
however, and persuaded to examine its tongue again, when another scale 
was removed, which made matters better for a few days, after which 
she was as ill as before. A third time this substance was removed 
which is now enclosed, and the top of the protuberance above the tail 
cut off with a pair of scissars, which induced bleeding. Next mornin°- 
two eggs were found below her perch, one the size of a marble, com¬ 
pletely shelled, the other the proper size, but without shell, and now she 
is in full health and vigour, and laying as usual. This has been accom- 
pushed without the aid of any physic, simply the persevering removal, 
by operation, of the horny substance which enveloped the low side of 
the tongue, and a little blood-letting. If this is the roup of England 
I am surprised that this mode of procedure is not known in England • 
at least, the writers in the ‘ Gardener ’ seem not to ho aware of it’ 
for there was not a person here to whom I mentioned the case who 
was not perfectly well aware of what was necessary to he done 
D. G. M'Lellan. 
[Youi hen was not affected with roup, hut with fever, and inflam¬ 
matory symptoms arising from over-excited egg organs. Bleeding as 
you did relieved her. The scale on the tongue is identical with the 
fur on the human tongue during severe fevers. Lower diet, and 
abundance of green food, will probably keep j our hen in health. _Ed.] 
. LtA 1 me glasses (Aof a Disappointed Exhibitor ).—The simple question 
is, where the birds the best that obtained the prizes? We cannot 
arfy proof n ^ m ° US * nuendos Swing pain and raising suspicions, without 
i 
I 
LOXDOX MARKETS.— July 26tii. 
ruuLiJti. 
London is getting thin. Everyone is flocking out of it. The 
S- ter n S haVe had .t h « r white bait dinner, and the demand for choice 
P° y becomes daily less. The supply will, however, diminish, owing 
to ham est operations m the country. The tendency of the market is 
downwards, as will he seen. 
_ Each. 
Large Fowls ... 4s. 6d. to 5s. C>d . 
Small ditto. 3 G „ 4 0 
Chickens. 2 0 ,,3 0 
Geese . 5 (j 
Ducks. 2 6 
6 G 
3 0 
Leverets. 3s. 
Pigeons . 0 
Guinea Fowls. 0 
Rabbits . 1 
Wild ditto. 0 
Each. 
0 d. to 4s. OcZ. 
8 „ 0 9 
0 „ 0 0 
4 „ 1 5 
9 ,, 0 10 
London 
