978 EXPERIMENTAL FARMS 



5 GEORGE v.. A. 1915 



EXPERIMENTAL STATION, KENTVILLE, N. S. 



REFOET OF SUFERINTENDEKT, W. SAXBY BLAIR. 



POULTRY. 



POULTRY HOUSES. 



Acting under the direction of the Dominion Poultry Husbandman, seven colony- 

 houses, 8 by 12 feet in size, were erected during the late summer. 



Two houses were constructed with a peaked roof, and the top above the eaves was 

 filled with straw after the ceiling had been slatted over with boards 4 inches wide 

 placed 1 inch apart. This arrangement affords excellent ventilation and gives 

 apparently a very dry house. The other five houses were of the shed-roof type, of 

 which fooir had the extreme open front with one window of twelve lights of 10 by 

 12-inch glass in the center of the south side, and at each side of this window, from 20 

 inches from the floor to the roof protected with a cotton screen only. The screened 

 area in these houses is 34 square feet for each house. Three of the four open-front 

 houses were constructed differently ; one was matched lumber covered with tar paper ; 

 one 8-inch boards battened; and one matched lumber not covered with tar paper. 

 The fifth house of the shed-roof type was constructed with a door in the center of the 

 south side and a window of twelve lights 10 by 12-inch glass on one side of the door 

 and on the other side a similar opening without glass and covered with cotton. 



These colony houses were constructed on a sill 6 by 6 inches placed the width of 

 the building. The sills were rounded at each end so that the houses can be drawn 

 from place to place as may be desired. Scantling 2 by 4 inches was used for the frame 

 and a single thickness of inch matched lumber was used except around the roosts, 

 where the walls were sheathed inside the studding to lessen the draft. 



One building 18 by 25 feet had previously been fitted up with three pens. The 

 pens were 8 by 13 feet with a 4-foot passage along the north side. In the south side 

 arc three windows, one for each pen, with twenty lights of 10 by 12-inch glass, and 

 on the east and west sides are two windows with four lights of 12 by 24-inch glass. 

 No cotton screens are used in this house. The ceilings are 7i feet high covered with 

 4-inch strips of wood 1-inch apart, and over this a 2-foot space is filled with straw. 



STOCK CARRIED DURING THE WINTER. 



These buildings provide ten pens which accommodate twenty hens and two 

 male birds each. As no stock had been reared at the Station it was necessary to pur- 

 chase the stock required; accordingly, during November, fifty Barred Plymouth Rock, 

 eighty White Wyandotte, forty Single Comb Rhode Island Red, and twenty Wliite 

 Leghorn hens were purchased, and later four Barred Plymouth Rock, six White 

 Wyandotte, two Rhode Island Red and two White Leghorn male birds were purchased, 

 making a total of 204 birds. 



For breeding stock one pen of 20 pullets of the Rhode Island Reds, was used select- 

 ing the best of the females, and with these mated the two cockerels. Two pens of twenty 

 each of the best Barred Rocks were selected for breeding in which pullets and the 

 four cockerels purchased were mated. Three pens, twenty each of the best Wliite 



