Perth Amboy evening news., 1920-11-26
THE s LETTER
OSTRICH CHARACTER.


aualyze the mind Of the ostrichE
This. In the opinion of the Keeper
of ostriches at the Los Angeles os-
trich farm. is precisely what the os-
trich needs. The queer Dlrd mas one
of the meanest dispositions 10 Dc
found outside the human famlly. ne
exhibits many symptoms OF typlcai
neuroses. And he possesses pecu-
liar. puritanicat ideas on the ques-
ions of sex. In MS ~prejudices,
perversities and s~tupidities, indeeo'
the bird is almost human.
In the first place, the ostrich Is
abnormally fniky about mating.
Some birds remain bachelors all
their lives. and every one chooses
his mate Only with great delay ana
caution. Usually ii takes two or
! three years of earnest and patient
courtship on the part OF the female
ostrich before she ensnares her prey
But once captured, the male ostrich
is her devoted slave for life. He
nutters anxiously about her while
she sits on the family eggs, and k
up an unnecessarily combatant at
! titude, one deadly toe nail raised
for fight, whenever another bird or
the keeper ventures within ten feet
of her. If she dies, moreover, he
remains a melancholy widowe 10
the end of his days.
When the present keeper first
came TO this ostrich farm. he very
much doubted the ostrich's SINGER
ity on this point. @"I had heard
about II. but / didn't believe it," he
said. So when one of the males was
widowed as the result of his vile
getting her head caught in the fence,
the keeper picked out the finest fe-
male i nthe flock and offered her as
a substitute. She was in the pen
Just three seconds, lie says, when
he had 70 risk his own life to get
her out. As it was, she received
such a hard kick that she nearly
died, and she is now in the hospital
pen. a sad and crestfallen bird-a
woman scorned.
The female has no such scrupies
when it comes to remarrying, and is
| polite, If not enthusiastic, to every
sutton introduced to her. Once in q
long while, also, a male bird is found
who is not so sternly monogamistic.
There is one of this type at the
farm who has condescended to es-
pouse two wives. They call him
Brigham Young"
\ Deadly Kick.
When the ostrich administers a
fighting kick with his great pointed
toe nail it is usually all over with
his victim. be 1t bird, lower animal
or man. This fact. combined with
his tricky, mean disposition. makes
the care of ostriches an exciting oc-
cupation. Fortunately. however
the bird is easily subdued by a very
| simple thing-a black stocking. All
the keeper has to do is to slip a long
black stocking ver the head of al
obtreperous ostrich, and he imme-
diately becomes as harmless as a
hen. Blinded in this fashion by a
stocking, ore oil the prize ostriche:
at the farm even permits himself &c
be harnessed to a light wagon, which
he pulls in giant ungainly strides
around the path at the farm, great
ly to the delight of the tourists. who
love to have themselves photo
graphed in the amazing rig.
The Los Angeles ostrich farm is
merely the city headquarters of
much larger farm which is situated
far out in the valley away from thC
path of the travelling public. There
hundreds of ostriches are kept in
a semi-wild state, and great acres
OF alfalfa grown for their food. But
as the city farm is an exact dupl!-
cate on a smaller scale. the tours
feels that he has received his mon
ey's worth when he pays his fiftI
cents to see how ostrich feathers
arc produced in California.
At one end of the enclosure in
which the few city birds are col
tanned is a small incubator plant
Here a few of the huge. specklet
eggs, weighing anywhere from three
.--l I~.Ip 30 Ex-n taatrIs npn a I
ways on exhibit. Visitors are per
mitted to handle them, and occa-
sionally they are sold. for, contrar!
to popular belief ostrich eggs arr
quite palatable. Ostrich hens lay OF
an average or every other day dur
ing the laying season. The egg
take forty-two days to hatch in tn
incubator (the birds are never al
lowed to do their own hatching) ant
after the chicks emerge from tn
she'll they are left in the incubato
for a couple of days until they ar,
dry. Then they are placed In TIN
brood pens until they are six o.
eight weeks old. 1t is at this as
hat the ostrich performs his famou
silly trick OF burying his head in tn
sand; which is not so silly after al
because in such a position he look
like a large unc OF dry grass
When eight weeks old the babe
are transferred to ruNs. enclosed b
wire fence. They grow at the rat
of a foot a month until they are 81
months old when they are suppose
to have reached their rull heigh'
According to the keeper, the male
and fenQles look alike until the
reach this age, when the feather
of the male begin TO turn black an
those. of the female remain gra.
This change of color seems to be
clever scheme of Natures for pre-
tecting the(young; for the feather
OF the female. who sits on the mes
during the day match the color c
the sand and those of the male. VIII
guards the nest at night, cannot b
seen in the dark.
Grown in Six Months.
At the age of six months, also. tn
birds receive their first clipping
and thereafter are clipped at inter
walls of nine months. The feather