Rural School Leaflet 851 



conditions and may also serve to suggest ways of improving your present 

 practices. 



Morning feed. — In the morning the fowls are hungry and ready to work 

 for their breakfast. It is well to let them keep as busy as possible. Work 

 keeps them warm, healthy, and contented. With this in mind, scatter 

 mixed grains in the litter. Be rather sparing of the feed in the morning, 

 so that the fowls will not quickly obtain their fill, but will continue to 

 work and hunt for the grain for the greater part of the forenoon. This 

 grain should be a mixture of all the kinds grown on the farm. They may 

 be mixed in the proportion of three pounds corn, two pounds wheat, and 

 one pound oats, to which may be added, if available, one pound buck- 

 wheat and one pound barley. Fresh water should be given to the chickens 

 every day. 



Noon feeding. — At the midday meal is the best time to provide those 

 appetizing mixtures so greatly relished by the fowls and so successful in 

 helping to produce eggs. Take the scraps of meat, bread, and vegetables, 

 or oatmeal, from the table, mix them with com meal, wheat bran, and 

 wheat middlings. Moisten the mass with skimmed milk until it is crumbly. 

 When skimm.ed milk and table scraps are not to be had, take a pail of 

 cut alfalfa or clover hay and pour boiling water on it, allowing it to steam. 

 Feed when it is still warm. A portion of this steamed alfalfa added to 

 the noon mash gives it a pleasant, appetizing odor. A little salt and pepper 

 can also be added to the mash, in about the same proportion as would be 

 used in your own food. When it is not convenient to make a moist mash, 

 the same ground feeds may be fed dry in a hopper that should be left . 

 open during the afternoon. A good mixture for this purpose is : six parts 

 corn meal, six parts wheat middlings, three parts wheat bran, five parts 

 meat scraps, one part oil meal. The best results will be obtained if the 

 hens eat about one third of the ground feed mixture to two thirds whole 

 or cracked grain. At noontime as much green food (beets, cabbage, 

 or lettuce) as the fowls will clean up before the following noon should be 

 given. At this time see that the oyster-shell and grit hoppers are filled. 

 When it is impossible to follow the practice of feeding three times a day, 

 the scraps and green food should be given with the morning feed. 



Night feeding. — ■ Fowls go to roost very early, making it necessary for 

 them to eat before sundown. This requires feeding in the latter part of 

 the afternoon, while they can still see to pick up the grain. When given 

 the opportunity, a fowl will go to roost with its crop rounding full of grain, 

 which it gradually digests during the night. This process of digestion 

 warms the body and keeps it more comfortable. An empty crop is a poor 

 bedfellow for the fowl. The same grains can be fed at night as in the morn- 

 ing, but in large quantities so that some will be left over after the fowl's 

 appetite has been entirely satisfied. 



