River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1904-11-24
OSTRICH FARMING PAYING.
New California Enterprise That rs
Giving Good Returns After Re-
peated Failure.

After 20-odd years of constant
| financial loss in ostrich farming and
the swallowing up of several English
mems fortunes of 100000 and $780,
| coo each, the industry has become one
| Of the most profitable in this region,
says the Pomona (Cal) Review. The
| South Pasadena ostrich farm, which
used to be loser by about $4,000 a
year, has become money-maker. It's
owner, Edwin Cawston, formerly of
England, cleared over $4,000 during
the year ended September 1.
| Most people have an idea that an
ostrich is plucked of its plumage by
holding the giant bird down with
straps and ropes, while an attendant
pulls the feathers indiscriminately
from the birds back and wings. But
harvesting ostrich feathers is a sci
entitic operation that demands expert
ence and care, lest birds costing from
| $500 to S1,700 be ruined for wealth
| production.
| When a plume is ready for It's
plucking it is known as ripe. The .os-
trich expert goes over the dock, care
fully selecting from it birds whose
feathers show that the ripening of
the plumes has set in. Then the birds
are separated into fiocks Of II and Ia,
and confined in little Enclosures, where
they may not run about aid damage
their valuable plumage. When all is
! roo Nv M Of nh
ing each ostrich is cajoled by basket
of food held before it out of the in
closure with it's mates into a narrow
passageway built OF heavy boards.
Front and rear gates are closed, and
| the great bird is prisoner between
walls of planks that reach to its back,
and where there is no room for it to
move in any direction. A cloth bag
is thrown over the ostrich's head and
the creature is fast in the tolls of the
feather harvester.
About half an hour is spent IN
plucking each ostrich. There are
three men in each plucking crew.
They stand upon a platform outside
the pen where the ostrich is held fast,
and with a dozen odd-shaped scissors
and appliances for ,stanching blood
that may flow from the birds torn
flesh work diligently. Care is taken
to leave enough feathers to protect the
smaller feathers, which will grow into
plumes by the next plucking. In the
carly days of ostrich farming in
southern California little attention
was given to these details, and in con-
sequence many birds died.
Most of the tail feathers are pulled,
not cut off, because they reproduce
better than on other parts of the os-
trich, and because they are so short
that the extra inch or two gained by
not shipping the feather is matter
of several dollars more profit. Each
plume when cut or pulled is laid in a
clean box.
While the feather harvest is pro-
ceeding the ostrich keeps up an inces-
SAINT low roaring, and but for the
tightness of the pen it would kick the
flank boards into slivers. At last,
when the pluckers have done, the
gates are opened and the bird rushes
out into the Enclosure to join it's mates.
Then another ostrich is cajoled into
the narrow pen, and the gathering of
other feathers goes on.
The plumage of the older birds is
Genominated secOnd-class in the mar
kets. The Older ostriches are kept
largely for breeding purposes. A few
Cstriches in Southern California are
more than 30 years old, and there are
records of Nubian ostriches that have
lived 20 and more years.
Ostrich farming is unusually pros
porous these days. All the southern
California ostrich farms that were
losing money steadily a few years ago
have doubled and trebled their num-
Der of ostriches and increased their
land holdings. Some 100000 is now
invested in ostrich farming in this re-
eion, and the annual output of feath-
ers has grown to be over 100000.
The success of California ostrich
farming has come largely from an in
yention of an ostrich incubator by
young woman in 1894. In ostrich do
He5CIC ecohoAiy CHe MAZE SICS upon
the nest of eggs laid in the sand, oc-
casionally relieved by the female.
In the hot Nubian deserts this plan
works admirably, hut on little farm
in the colder climate of California,
where the birds flock together, the sit
ter has SO much to distract it from the
Lest that the eggs are frequently al
lowed to get cold at night. Therefore
a whole annual setting has often been
lost The incubators have remedied
all this, and now the percentage of
loss by infertile eggs is less than ten
per cent
City Planting a Forest.
No1 - q nno