The new dominion. [volume] (Morgantown, W. Va.) 1876-1904, 1879-01-18
TOPICS FOR THE FARM.
Management of P0uItry


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Management Of Poultry CasSelPs
Domestic Dictionary" remarks that
management has almost everything to
do with profit from poultry, and must
vary with circumstances, though few
cardinal rules must always be observed
AS general rule, farmers and country
people do not feed their poultry enough,
and people in towns too much. They
should always be fed twice day, morn
ing and evening, with as much as they
will eagerly run after if thrown in
small quantities, but no more. The
consequences of too little food to birds
expected to produce matter so rich in
nutriment as eggs must be obvious; on
the other hand, to give them as much
as they can eat is not only wasteful, but
in confinement will stop laying and
cause ill health. The second rule is
never to keep old birds, but to regularly
kill and draft them off when two and
half years old, replacing by young
pullets. This is rule few attend to;
but as old hens lay few eggs, the need
of it is obvious. Other points must de-
pend on place and circumstance. Even
on farm the object may be eggs or
chickens. For eggs, one of the Spanish
varieties will usually answer best; and
regular feeding, selection of young
will always yield good result--the
hen-wife, of course, seeing to it that as
early as possible every spIlng she
matches enough chickens to supply the
place of old hens drafted off. If chick
ems are the object, the great aim is to
get them out early in January, or even
December; such birds take much care.
Early sitters are obtained by the early
Matched pullets of the preceding year,
and the chickens need very frequent
feeding, dry shelter, and food at night
after dark; but the profit when well
managed is great. In more usual
proceedings, the main thing is to
keep the chickens clean, and to feed
regularly at least four times day with
good meal made into crubly paste,
and little tail wheat at night. This is
where farm poultry often fails, the
chickens being sighted in this way, and
often given only sopped bread and bar
ley, which for them is almost worthless,
though barley is good food for fowls
The manure should be carefully gath
cred every week, and mixed with earth
for use on the farm. Many people, by
good management, make a good profit
from a few fowls in the bottom of a
town garden, besides the indescribable
luxury of new-laid eggs, and the occu-
patton the fowls give them. For this
object, also, some of the Spanish kinds
will usually answer best, the Leghorn
variety often doing exceedingly we'll
A wooden house, thoroughly wind and
weather proof, say four feet SO uare, and
a covered run the same depth and the
width of the garden, will keep half a
dozen such fowls.
Corn as Feed for HOrses-We do
not share the feelings of many of our
friends touching the relative merits of
corn and oats as feed for horses. Old
John Harper attributed the splendid
success of Longfellow and his compan-
ions in fame, in great degree, to the
corn diet on which he fed them. The
old Kentuckian said, "To our notion
nothing is so strengthening to the race
horse as good old yellow Ohio corn
We give ours just about twenty-eight
good, round ears every day, when in
training, and when they don't eat it
quite ali up, we give them a little more
exercise to strengthen their appetites,
and that makes them run from end to
end" Certain it is that the owner and
trainer of such horses as Endorser,
Lyttleton, Longfellow and scores of
other celebrated ones, should have
known what he was talking about. As
to ourselves, we are inclined to think
that good, bright corn might be fed
during our cold, New England winters
to much greater extent than it is,
with profit. We doubt if oats make a
sufficiently generous diet, considering
the sudden and violent changes of our
atmosphere, and the severe work to
which our driving horses are frequently
put. 1t is fact that nearly all horses
prefer corn to any other form of dry
food. Our idea is that ears of ground
corn, cob and ali, and fed with cracked
or mashed oats in the ratio of two to
one, is, on the whole, the best diet that
can be fed to stock during the winter
and spring months. 1t does put the
shine into their coats, and bring back
the coltish spirits wonderfully.