202 ANNUAL REPORT OP THE Oft. Doc. 



dairy animal is commendable. Scrub bulls ought not to be allowed 

 to exist. It is particularly desirable that we grade up our animals 

 with that type of principle blood best adapted to our locality. 



THE VALUE OF VIGOR IN POULTRY 



PROF. T. F. McGRBW, 



Principal, School of Poultry Husbandry, International Correspondence School, 



Scranton, Pa. 



I wish to say first, Ladies and Gentlemen, that I am in favor of 

 Prof. Stevens' Cow Testing Associations. When I was a boy, my 

 mother gave me a cow, and from the milk she did not take, I got 

 twelve and a half pounds of churned milk. This was one of the first 

 cow testing associations in Philadelphia. 



I want to say a word to you about the importation of Chinese 

 eggs. Speculators are trying to prevent the people from buying 

 them by sending out notices that the eggs are not fit to use because 

 the hens have not been properly fed on a wholesome diet. Now don't 

 you people get frightened about these Chinese eggs. Mr. Jaffrey, of 

 Berkley, California, has examined thousands of these eggs, and they 

 are just as good as any other eggs kept the same length of time. They 

 are fed rice and barley, which is called "puddy," and corresponds to 

 the corn we feed our chickens. What they call barley is practically 

 the same thing we call corn. The ground on which they keep these 

 chickens is kept clean; they must keep it clean, or they would have 

 a pestilence, and they have enough English and Germans and Ameri- 

 cans at Shanghai to see that there is nothing allowed that would 

 produce a pestilence; besides, they have to use these eggs. I don't 

 know whether you people here are for high tariff, or for low tariflf, 

 but the fact remains that the tariff has been reduced, and eggs will 

 come in and corn will come in, and cotton will come in; and we 

 must adjust ourselves to the conditions as we find them. In our 

 school we have students all over the world — China, Japan, Africa 

 and everywhere; recently one of my Chinese students cut out of an 

 American paper that was wrapped around something we sent him, 

 a market quotation on the price of eggs; this he has tacked up on 

 the wall of his house, and he sells his eggs today according to the 

 market price at Philadelphia last January. 



The first requisite in poultry husbandry is to get good, vigorous 

 stock; next, select with care; then put them in a clean, dry house; 

 feed them about a quarter less corn, but balance with oats, or wheat, 

 and give them alfalfa or clover hay, and that is all that is necessary 

 except to see that they are kept dry and clean and free from lice, 

 and you will have eggs to sell right along. A friend of mine out in 

 Dakota built a crescent shaped shed, such as they use out there 

 for their cattle in the winter. The chickens got in there one year 



