Beeton's book of poultry and domestic animals - Thurman Lodge ...

PAIBIIla AND BKEeDDre.
end disporting themselves according to their natures. Presently,
however, they -will grow more sedate, and the hen wiU
set about egg-laying. First she lays one, which she keeps
faithful guard over, and next day she lays the other—always
two, never more nor less.
At this period no husband is more faithful than the hepigeon.
He feeds his hen while she is sitting; he fills his
crop with water, and from it she quenches her thirst. Towards
the middle of the day she goes abroad for necessary air and
exercise, while he contentedly cuddles the promising eggs beneath
him. If, indeed, she should prove so callous a mother
as to think more of taking her pleasure than hatching her eggs,
father pigeon will meekly keep his seat, and comfort the eggs
till the shells burst and the chicks emerge.
This win occur at the expiration of seventeen days from the
laying of the second egg. On this point, as well as on another
equally important, writers of pigeon books seem agreed to
countenance a delusion. One author, whose information in all
other particulars is tolerably correct, confidently asserts that
the hatching will take place on the twentieth day from the
laying of the second egg. Several others, with equal gravity,
tell us that exactly nineteen days must transpire between the
second laying and the birth, whereas the truth is—and everybody
that has kept as few as half-a-dozen pigeons must be
aware of it—that seuenteen days, within a few hours, is the
invariable time consumed by incubation.
Again, trusting entirely to information and instruction de-
rived from writers whom, we presume, to be perfect masters of
the subject, the amateur is subject to great disappointment as
regards the number of hatchings he may reasonably expect in
the course of a year. He is told that by proper management " he
may raise as many as tweVoe broods in a single year." With all
due deference to those who make the assertion, I declare that
they are utterly mistaken. With proper management, if you
are very lucky, you may count on a hatching once in every six
weeks through the year, which will give you mne hatchings in
the twelve months. Even this, however, is the exception and
not the rule, and I should advise my readers to rest contented
if they are enabled to raise seven broods in the time.
The writers in question would have been nearer truth if they
had declared that a hatching or two more than usual might be
obtained by imiproper management, that is, by stuffing the poor
birds during the chilly months with hemp-seed. They certainly