no BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Jan., 



one hundred dollars each, why I should expect to capture some 

 of those prizes. I would have my breeding stock also on the 

 colony plan, which I will describe later. Then on the fifty acres 

 remaining of that part of the farm set with the larger fruit, 

 the apples, peaches, and plums, I would use to keep my stock 

 upon devoted to the production of market eggs. That would 

 make a poultry range for that stock of fifty acres. Now I 

 would have the best egg machine I could get for the production 

 of those eggs. From my experience and observation, I should 

 say today that the White Leghorn on such a range gives the 

 best results. We get a fairly large white egg, and an egg that 

 in the New York market brings top prices. I would scatter 

 over those fifty acres my colony houses, built perhaps ten by 

 twenty, and designed to accommodate fifty fowls. In other 

 words, I would put on about four houses to the acre. That is, 

 if I wanted to keep the largest number possible on that num- 

 ber of acres. Of course, you can have the intensive colony 

 system or you can have the extensive. You can let a hundred 

 hens run over five acres if you wish, but I think it is all right 

 on the colony system to put two hundred hens on an acre. If 

 the land was good, they would get all the green food they 

 would require. Therefore, I would stock those fifty acres with 

 poultry at the rate of two hundred per acre. Now I would 

 have my colony houses scattered, and assuming that I have 

 them filled with White Leghorns, I am all ready for business. 

 Now many of you think, undoubtedly, it would be quite a task 

 to care for so many. It would under the old system, but under 

 the new it would be nothing but play. I would not feed my 

 hens over once a week. I would feed them in self-feeding 

 hoppers. I would have my man fill up those hoppers once a 

 week. I would have him fill them with wheat screenings, if 

 I could get them. They are, on the whole, as economical a 

 poultry food as I think we can get. I would have one hopper 

 filled with wheat screenings, and another with beef scraps. 

 That would give them all they need. Then in the winter I 

 would supplement the wheat screenings by giving them 

 cracked corn at night, giving them all they want. There is no 

 danger of a hen that is fit to lay, and that is worth keeping, 

 eating too much of a well-balanced ration. More hens are 

 starved than over-fed with the right kind of food. Snow and 

 corn would not make an ideal poultry food. It would not make 



