The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1872-06-08
Rearing and Fattening Poultry.

Rearing and Fattening Poultry.
No interference should be permitted dur
ing the whole of the incubation, unless, at
the close of it, the chicken should not be
able to free himself from the glutinous sub
stance that lines the inside Of the egg: nor
should any of the chickens be taken away
as they are Matched, for this will only dis
turb the hen and the others. She should be
left quiet alone until she comes chuckling
from her nest with all her little ones about
her.
The proprietor may not wish to have too
many broods of chickens running about at
the same time. If there is not more than
a day or two difference in their age, he can
select &he last that Matched her chickens,
or he can take the most careful or the best
mother, and give her the whole ofthe broods.
If the other hens are then placed at dis
tance, they will give over chuckling in the
course of day or two, aud begin to lay
eggs again.
The best food for newly-hatched chick
ems is shelled oats, boiled for minute Or
two; to this may be added a little hard boil
ed egg, or crumbs of bread. The mother
will provide them with plenty of insects
and other food. There is one kind of food
with which, in the course of week or two,
they may be INDUCED without restraint
Every one who has much to do with poult-
ry will have a brood basket in which he can
carry the hen and her chickens to different
parts of the yard or farm. In the month
of June or July, and when the garden crop
is attacked by the fly, or is threatened to be
SO attacked, this basket may be carried in
to the garden. The wicker-work will allow
the chickens to go out, and they will pur-
sue and pick up all the larvae or insects,
and all other creatures destructive to the
young crop. When one space is cleared
the basket may be moved, until the greater
part of the garden is gone over. If there
are different baskets, and different broods,
they must be placed at such distances as
not to be able to intermix.
After week the hen may be suffered to
run abroad with her brood. She will need
this indulgence, and her health will be i'm
proved by it. She will also teach them the
most suitable kinds of food, and by her
habit ofscratching will procure them much
that would otherwise be lost.
For chickens that are intended to be fat
tened, the grain during the first Week, or,
perhaps, for considerable part of the time
should be STEPPED in water, or boiled for
few minutes. Thehot liquor may be thick
ened with oats or barley meal to firm or al
most solid state. Pea-meal, or boiled pota-
toes, given warm, and corn, or almost any
food of this kind, which is most convenient
to the owner, and which does not excite pur-
ging, may be substituted. In the course of
ten or twelve weeks the chickens will have
become sufficiently grown to send to tue
market.
1t will be, however, necessary to bring a
certain portion of them to a higher state of
condition and fairness than can be accom-
plished by these means. The 6arn-door fed
fowl is in great requisition. He is suffered
to run about the different yards, picking up
waste corn, and food of various kinds that
comes in his way-dilgently attending the
barn-door when the grain is thrashed out
and occasionally coming in for more from
the hand, when it is thought that his crop
may not be sufficiently full. With all this
nutrimen:, and the digestive organs being
kept in full energy by the exercise which
he takes, he acquires a peculiar state of con-
dition that renders his flesh highly palat-
able in the estimation of epicures. He is
plump, and covered with healthy and we'll
tasted flesh; and there is not much fat
mingling with it to disgust those who are
fanciful on these subjects.
This method of preparing the fowl is not
always sufficiently repaid for the purpose of
the feeder, and then the creature is cooped
up, and not only has as much food before
him as he is disposed to take, but is cram
med with more.
The process continues, perhaps, seven or
eight days, and the bird certainly increases
rapidly in weight. He has accumulated
an additional quantity of fat, but the fleshy
part, the most wholesome, and the most
pleasant to the taste, is considerably dimin-
ished. The appearance of the fowl on the
table is improved, but he is far less valu-
able in the estimation of the connoisseur.
This leads to the subject of Capons.-
The large short, bodied male fowls are cas-
trated, and that invariably gives DISPOSE
ton to accumulate fat and unwholesome
flesh. The fine large fowls that are seen in
the poulterers' shops have undergone this
process. They are shut up in some dark
place, enclosed in coops, and crammed with
barley, or other meal, formed into paste
by means of hot liquor; and this operation
is repeated several times in day. The
consequence of this overloaded crop is that
the bird becomes indisposed to move, and |
is rendered sleepy, and is soon thickly
covered with unwhofesome fat The ca
pon-feeders are much belied if they do not
go farther than this. They mix ardent
spirits with the paste by which the birds
are crammed, and that, and the darkened