292 ANNUAL REPORT OF THE Off. ]>oc. 



POULTRY 



BY F. W. TOWER. Beaver Center, Pa. 



READ AT DICKSONBURG INSTITUTE, CRAWFORD CO., JAN. 12, 1901. 



The value of poultry on the farm depends wliolly to proper care 

 and attention to the numerous little details that present themselves 

 daily. Poultry pays best of all side branches to the farm if we be- 

 stow upon it the care that it justly deserves. Like any other branch 

 of agriculture, we must not expect to reap unless we sow. 



The farmer who provid-es warm and pleasant poultry houses, and 

 thus changes as near as possible winter into summer, judiciously se- 

 lects food, and maintains the proper heat and health of the egg-ma- 

 chines, will surely reap his reward in a well filled egg-basket. But 

 do not flatter yourself that plenty of corn with a few shells for 

 desert, will prove satisfactory to you when you look over your egg 

 record. 



When winter eggs are desired, try the following menu for your 

 poultry: Cooked vegetables seasoned with a little salt and pepper 

 and a little oil meal for breakfast, and slightly warmed water or 

 skimmed milk for drink. Do not feed so much that the fowls will 

 gorge themselves and be lazy and mopish; just sufficient to prepare 

 them for the second course, which is wheat and oats and buckwheat 

 scattered in a chaff litter; this necessitates them to work for what 

 they get. Keep bone and shells constantly in the troughs; also dust 

 for wallowings, and note how they enjo}' the dust bath. For the 

 evening, feed, if the weather be cold, corn, not shelled, but the ears 

 broken, or chopped into sections with a hatchet. If the weather be 

 mild, would prefer part oat», wheat or buckwheat. Meat in some 

 form, dessicated if not obtainable otherwise, two or three times a 

 week must be provided. Cabbage and other green food must be 

 given occasionally. 



Now to make a long story short, furnish good quarters, place 

 proper egg material where the egg machine gets it and it is impos- 

 sible for it not to shell out the eggs. There are many poultry keepers 

 who give the warm, worked food for the evening meal, and I am not 

 prepared to dispute the advisability of (hat plan of feeding. 



As to the proper breed for year around egg producers, I considier 

 the Bufl" Leghorn the best. But each one has a favorite, and justly 

 so, for each breed has its individual merit. It costs no more to feed 



