RAISING SQUABS FOR MARKET
A few years' experience in raising fancy pigeons for pets is the best kind of training for a young man who wants to raise squabs for market. This business on a small scale ought not to take all one's time and can easily be combined with some other business or profession or with attending college. But your experience, varied though it may be, has not acquainted you with all that is worth knowing on the subject. The time has gone by when a man can afford to ignore books and bulletins even on a subject upon which he may himself be an authority. A library of pigeon literature will increase your wisdom. A practical man writing of his experience in your business may save you hundreds of dollars if you heed his advice. Don't scoff at college bulletins as your grandfather probably did. He had reason, but the bulletin is not what it was. Great strides forward have been made. Visit some big squab raiser's plant and take mental and written notes of significant facts observed. The colour of his pigeon loft does not affect the price he gets for his squabs, but the quality of the grain he feeds has a direct influence on the fullness of his wallet.
Full-blooded homers are declared by many to be the best, all things considered, for table use. Good, mated birds of this variety can be bought for about two dollars a pair. They are hardy, bright, active on their feet, and the squabs have a larger breast than some of the other sorts.
Homers are not all the same colour; some are white, others black, reddish, and mixed colours. Good stock will rear six or eight pairs of squabs in a year, while some exceptionally good ones will raise ten pairs. If you make a clear profit of one dollar and twenty-five cents per year on an average from each pair you should do well. It is not profitable to keep birds which produce less than five pairs a year. A record must be kept in order to weed out worthless birds. You do not wish to spend your leisure running a free boarding house for pigeons. You must know which are the big producers and keep only their young as breeders. Nests should be numbered and every bird have a leg label with a number corresponding to a numbered description in your book of records. This is good economics.
Squabs of homers should be ready for selling at four weeks old; they should be fully feathered but still in the nest. The heaviest grade weigh eight pounds per dozen and these bring highest market prices. Lighter birds are considered poor quality and bring a correspondingly low price. Prices vary from four dollars and fifty cents to one dollar and seventy-five cents per dozen. Dispose of pairs which habitually produce light-weight squabs as indicated by your records.
Minute directions for killing and dressing squabs for market are given in Farmers' Bulletin No. 177, which every squab raiser should have in his library.
There is, as yet, no indication of over-production in squab raising; although many more are grown every year, the demand is still on the increase. It is a good business for two people to go into together, a brother and sister, two brothers, or adjoining neighbours.
Descriptions of house and furnishings, fly, foods and feeding, and details of care are given in Chapter IV under "Raising Fancy Pigeons."