December  4,  1902. 
JOURNAL  OF  HORTICULTURE  AND  COTTAGE  GARDENER . 
531 
NAMES  OF  PLANTS. — -Correspondents  whose  queries  are  un¬ 
answered  in  the  present  issue  are  respectfully  requested  to  consult  the 
following  number.  (B.  F.  T.). — 1,  Begonia  eoeeinea  ;  2,  B.  fuchsioicles  ; 
3,  B.  Verschaffelti ;  4.  B.manicata  ;  5  B.Rexvar.  (A.C.  T.). — Teucrium 
frutieosa  and  Abies  Menziesi,  the  latter  assuming  your  form  of  it,  near 
the  southern  coast.  (L.  F.).— 1,  Calanthe  Veitchi.  (N.).— 1,  Cym- 
bidium  Dayanum  ;  2,  Lueulia  gratissima  ;  3,  Cypripedium  Leeanum  ; 
4.  Dendrobium  aureum  ;  5,  Cymbidium  giganteum  ;  6,  Nerine  flexuosa. 
(T.  J.  B.). — Iris  stytosa. 
NAMES  OF  FRUITS. — Correspondents  ivhose  queries  are  un¬ 
answered  in  the  present  issue  are  respectfully  requested  to  consult  the 
following  number.  (G.  G.  H.). — 1,  Belle  Dubois;  2,  Lane’s  Prince 
Albert;  3,  Bramley’s  Seedling;  4,  Barchard’s  Seedling;  5,  Round 
Winter  Nonsuch;  6,  Winter  Greening.  (H.  S.). — 1,  Borsdorfer  ;  2, 
Annie  Elizabeth;  3,  Rambour  Franc.  (H.  W.  MackercthV- Not 
recognised  ;  probably  a  local  variety.  (S.  C.  A.  H.). — Dutch  Mignonne. 
(A.  T.). — 1,  Peasgood’s  Nonesuch;  2,  Emperor  Alexander. 
We  are  now  fast  approaching  the  shortest  days — each 
afternoon  finds  the  lamp  lit  earlier,  and  each  morning  the 
day  breaks  with  greater  reluctance.  Not  only  are  the  days 
short,  but  they  are  sensibly  dreary,  cold,  and  more  or  less 
miserable.  Mist  which  degenerates  into  fog,  drizzle  that 
culminates  into  heavy  downpour ;  hard  frost  one  morning, 
soaking  wet  the  next,  and  so  on.  If  there  is  a  time  that 
laying  fowls  are  unprofitable  it  is  now.  Many  are  only  just 
recovering  from  their  season  of  moult,  some  are  even  now 
only  just  starting  ;  eggs  as  a  nde  are  scarce,  and  consequently 
dear.  The  outgoings  for  food  are  great,  the  incomings 
almost  trivial  We  are  speaking  of  the  masses:  not  of  the 
classes.  We  will  begin  at  home.  We  are  cheerful  and  con¬ 
tented,  and  the  reason  is  not  far  to  seek— we  have  eggs. 
On  or  about  April  23  we  hatched  off  some  white  and  buff 
Leghorn  chicks,  and  the  first  of  these,  a  white,  began  to  lay 
October  6.  The  others  presently  followed  suit,  and  so  we  go 
on.  Not  only  are  our  pullets  laying,  but  some  Plymouth 
Rocks  who  annoyed  us  sadly  by  persistent  sitting  in  the 
summer,  have  come  into  profit  now.  They  were  wiser  than 
we.  “  Why,”  they  argued,  “  should  we  be  laying  when  our 
eggs  only  make  so  little?  Only  average  eighteen  for  Is. 
We  will  rest  now  and  moult  early,  and  then  see  what  we  can 
do  in  the  dull  days,  and  when  eggs  are  selling  at  seven  and 
eight  for  Is.”  These  were  self-respecting  fowls,  and  a 
comfort  to  their  owner. 
A  friend  of  ours — of  whom  some  neighbours  say  she  is 
poultry-mad,  and  whom  others  prefer  to  call  poultry-wise 
— is  selling  now  at  this  present  moment  hundreds  of  eggs 
per  week  at  the  pleasantly  high  prices.  True,  she  devotes 
herself  entirely  to  her  fowls,  and  her  situation  and  surround¬ 
ings  are  exceptionally  good.  An  isolated  farmhouse  with 
heaps  of  buildings,  and  surrounded  by  dry,  sandy  grass  land. 
We  say  grass  for  courtesy,  but  really  it  is  only  rabbit  warren, 
with  Whin  bushes  all  over,  and  full  of  little  dells  and  sunny 
hillsides.  This  friend  is  guided  by  two  great  principles. 
Her  first  is  not  to  hatch  her  chickens  too  early  (that  is,  her 
future  egg  producers),  and  the  second  is  to  feed  wTell  and 
get  them  forward  and  healthy  without  superabundant  fat. 
She  has  a  pan  in  the  oven  or  a  pot  on  the  fire  for  everlasting, 
and  the  great  secret  is  strict  personal  attention  ;  nothing  is 
left  to  servants.  We  may  modestly  say  the  same  thing  our¬ 
selves,  and  we  have  found  that  we  can  combine  efficiency 
with  economy  in  food  rations. 
It  is  not  the  most  lavish  feeders  who  meet  with  the  best 
suceess.  We  believe  there  are  stones  upon  stones  of  good 
corn  wasted  constantly  by  poultry-keepers  who,  though  they 
provide  the  food,  quite  neglect  to  supply  any  apparatus  for 
its  mastication.  It  is  part  of  our  regular  routine  to  provide, 
by  means  of  a  hammer  and  broken  crockery,  a  quantity  of 
conveniently  shaped  “  grit,”  to  make  or  take  the  place  of 
internal  crop  teeth.  If  poultry  owners  would  give  the  matter 
a  thought  they  would  easily  see  that  the  natural  supply  of 
“  grit”  is  soon  exhausted  in  any  fowl-run,  however  extensive 
(indeed,  we  might  say  on  grass  runs  it  does  not  exist),  and 
therefore  it  behoves  us  to  make  good  the  lack.  We  noticed 
only  to-day  (how  it  happened  we  cannot  say)  that  a  fowl  or 
fowls  had  passed  some  grains  of  corn  practically  in  exactly 
the  same  state  as  they  had  been  when  eaten.  Now,  that 
corn  could  have  done  the  fowl  no  good  at.  all.  The  supply 
of  “  grit  ”  must  be  constant.  Why  ?  Because  by  constant 
friction  the  sharp  edges  get  worn  away,  and  the  grit  is  use¬ 
less.  We  believe  that  “  experts  ”  allow  ten  days  as  the  limit 
of  usefulness  to  a  piece  of  sharp  grit. 
We  have  noticed  ourselves  when  opening  a  fowl,  how  dull 
edged  have  been  certain  bits  of  what  was  very  sharp  china 
only  a  few  days  before.  In  some  neighbourhoods  flint  does 
not  exist.  It  is  a  splendid  masticator,  and  the  supply  of 
best  china  (broken)  sometimes  falls  rather  short.  There  is 
no  doubt  at  all  that  fowls  pay  for  a  little  meaty  food,  and 
our  successful  poultry  friend  buys  a  good  deal  every  week 
of  the  butcher  in  the  form  of  plucks.  She  does  not  ad¬ 
minister  this  raw,  but  well  boiled,  and  then  passed  through 
a  sausage  machine.  We  are  great  believers  in  a  liberal 
supply  of  vegetables — Carrots  and  Swedes,  boiled  or  raw. 
If  boiled,  they  may  be  mashed  down  with  the  paste  which 
forms  the  morning’s  meal.  Sometimes  it  is  impossible  to 
get  much  green  food,  or  rather  to  get  enough  green  food, 
during  the  winter  months,  so  these  roots  eke  out  the  scanty 
supply.  A  few  well  ripened  Mangolds  afford  a  pleasant 
amusement,  and  keep  fowls  from  moping. 
.  We  have  said  we  find  the  buff  and  the  white  Leghorns 
good  layers,  and  if  anyone  could  tell  us  a  plan  by  which  we 
could  ensure  hatching  only  pullets,  we  should  be  most  thank¬ 
ful.  Leghorn  cockerels  are  poor  things  ;  they  are  too  small 
in  frame  ever  to  be  built  up  into  good  table  birds,  and  if  we 
could  only  distinguish  them  when  quite  young  we  would 
gladly  sell  every  young  cockerel  at  the  week  old. 
We  have  just  had  a  poultry  lecturer  in  this  village,  and 
he  assures  us  every  well-grown  cockerel  costs  10s.  before  it 
is  fit  for  table  !  We  think  he  has  a  little  overshot  the  mark  ; 
but  there  is  no  doubt  of  it  that  many  young  birds  eat  oft* 
their  heads  time  and  time  again.  The  only  way  to  make 
them  pay  is  to  hatch  off  early  in  the  New  Year,  feed  up 
quickly,  and  sell  before  or  at  Asparagus  time,  when  there  is 
no  game,  and  only  lamb,  veal,  and  duckling  to  vary  the 
monotony  of  the  rich  man’s  table. 
To  those  of  our  readers  who  have  incubators  and  patience, 
we  strongly  recommend  the  early  hatching  of  selling  chickens, 
and  the  April  hatching  of  chickens  intended  as  stock  birds, 
i.e.,  layers  in  October  and  so  forward.  The  reason  the  earlier 
hatches  do  not  make  good  winter  layers  is  because  they 
begin  too  early,  moult  just  when  you  want  them  most,  and 
don’t  recover  themselves  till  well  into  the  New  Year. 
We  have  spoken  about  the  incubator,  which  will  soon  be 
coming  into  active  service.  All  our  care,  skill,  and  patience 
lavished  upon  it  will  be  of  little  avail  unless  we  use  some 
judgment  with  respect  to  the  eggs  with  which  it  is  going 
to  be  filled.  The  birds  which  are  now  laying  most  freely  are 
the  pullets,  but  it  is  neither  wise  nor  desirable  to  set  their 
eggs.  It  is  like  breeding  from  immature  stock  ;  there  will 
be  constitutional  delicacy,  and  winter  hatched  birds  must 
be  as  robust  as  possible.  Circumstances  are  all  against 
them.  Then  again,  it  won’t  do  to  use  the  eggs  from  birds 
that  have  been  laying  continuously  for  any  length  of  time  ; 
their  eggs,  too,  will  be  lacking  in  vitality.  Sitting  and  rear¬ 
ing  a  brood  of  chickens  is  a  rest  to  a  hen  ;  she  has  probably 
been  rather  better  fed,  and  she  comes  to  her  renewed  laying 
well  and  strong. 
Then  as  to  her  mate.  A  fine  good  cock  must  be  selected, 
and  in  winter  he  will  not  require  to  be  run  with  more  than 
four  or  five  hens.  One  little  exhortation  about  the  food. 
This  harvest,  alas !  has  been  productive  of  much  damaged 
grain — some  of  it  so  bad,  in  fact,  as  to  be  absolutely  useless 
—yet  we  fear,  and  indeed  we  know,  that  a  great  deal  of  this 
black,  wet,  decaying  stuff  will  be  set  before  the  poultry  of 
the  farm,  and  they  will  be  expected  on  it  to  lay  eggs,  look 
well,  and  do  well.  This  trash  may  fill  them,  but  be  no  more 
beneficial  than  the  rations  of  clay  some  savage  nations  take 
to  quell  the  pangs  of  hunger. 
We  are  not  very  sure  about  the  value  of  spices  and  condi-  - 
ments.  If  given  at  all  it  should  be  with  a  sparing  hand. 
There  is  so  much  food  available  for  poultry  that  with  properly 
diversified  meals  the  fowl  gets  change  and  variety  enough. 
We  believe  in  rearing  the  strong,  not  coddling  up  the  de'icate. 
We  all  know  feather  beds  among  the  better  classes  are  things 
of  the  past ;  but  that  does  not  do  away  with  the  fact  that 
there  is  still  a  good  market  for  feathers,  not  only  of  the  best 
