Lewiston teller. [volume] (Lewiston, North Idaho) 1878-1900, 1891-03-19
OSTRICH FEATHER TALK.
HOW THE BIRDS ARE RAISED
FOR PROFIT.
The Plunes That Fashion Demands-The Value
Of the Feathers and How They are Ilnr.
vested-Plucked Birds Protest
Against Fashion.

1t is estimated that this country ex-
ponds So, 600. 900 u year for these Or
naments Each ostrich when full
grown yields feather income of from
5000 to $500 per annum. The elegant,
long, black and white plumes sell for
IS each at the farms and readily bring
$40 each at retail in New York or
Chicago.
Every feather has value. If it is
sufficiently large for its use it is worth
at least 10 cents. The very small ones.
otherwise useless, make up into cheap
souvenirs and are eagerly purchased
by visiting tourists at prices varying
from 10 cents to 81. The plumes pro-
duced in southern California are fully
as valuable as those from the far-away
Cape Colony.
The eggs, if fertile, sell for $25 each
and generally from IS to 80 per cent.
of all eggs produced will hatch. If
not fertile the shells are in demand at
from 2 to Is as curios and ornaments.
A young ostrich just out of the shell is
considered equivalent to $50 and his
value increases until be is full grown,
when $500 is low market price.
The expense OF maintaining an o.
trich farm is comparatively slight
The birds in this country are usually
healthy; their appetites are appalling.
but they arc satisfied with alfalfa,
cabbage and crushed bones for regu-
lar diet On occasions they expect
large and small pebbles. bits OF iron,
old shoes, tin cans and such delicacies.
A hungry ostrich il not particular
about his food. 1t is merely a question
of deglutition with him. II what he
eats will 60 down-or rather up-his
somewhat elastic throat (for he eats
nnd drinks head downward) he feels
safe to trust his digestive organs to do
the rest.
The ostrich has long been maligned.
In our schoolboy days natural history
taught us to despise the ostrich, first
because of its lack OF sense. and Sec
Ond for its want of parental instincts.
We were told that this great, ungainly
bird when chased by a native South
African upon the back of fleet horse
or tame ostrich, would hide his
weary head in the sand under the i'm
preston that if he could not see bis
pursuer the pursuer could not see him.
This fable is no more true, at least of
the domesticated bird, than the other,
which actually says that the mother
ostrich lays her eggs in the hot sand
and leaves them to the tender care OF
the sun and the Hottentot.
The ostrich eggshell is sometimes
one-sixteenth OF TN inch thick. 1t /,
fully twenty-four times the size of an
ordinary hens egg. Incubation re-
quires forty days, during which period
the male and female alternate in the
domestic duty of keeping the eggs
warm. Most OF the Matching is now
done by incubators. A three-hundred-
egg incubator has a capacity OF but
twenty-seven ostrich eggs.
When the birds are seven months
old the first plucking occurs, and
l
their feathers twice year. The fe-
males begin laying eggs at;three years
Of age and porduce from thirty to
ninety eggs each annually.
| In South Africa, until about thirty
years ago, the natives killed the os-
trich for his plumes. Since that date
the domesticated birds have furnished
most OF the feathers OF commerce.
Each bird. when fully grown, has
/ twenty five plumes on each wing. with
J two rows of floss feathers underneath.
With the white plumes are row of
long feathers and under them are a
smaller size. In tho male these are
black and in tine female drab. The
Tail has also tuft OF feathers similar
~ arranged. The first feathers are
lot usually as fine in quality, as large
n size or as great in quantity as those
II subsequent pluckings.
Through the year constant care is
aiken to gather up any feathers which
my be shed naturally. The feathers
are carefully cured and pressed be-
ore they are ready for the market.
An ostrich plucking is some what ex.
citing. The timid bipeds are driven
or coaxed. one at a time. into small
in closures. and two or three men take
told OF the frightened bird. The head
is covered by stocking" which
renders the fiercest old ostrich com
paratively tractablc.
The larger feathers are then clipped
off and placed in a basket Thus IA
/ Inc bird has offered very little resist
,nce. but after the plumes are secure,
= ne quilts must be removed. Thi
! gives the poor ostrich pain. which h,
D resents by a frantic effort to kick hi
:, tormentors. Being blindfolded, how
| nh To %;