No. 5. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 205 



long to keep the cockerels from killing one another." Whether the 

 hen was first or whether the egg was first makes but little differ- 

 ence. The common cause of their creation may be shrouded in mys- 

 tery, but of one thing we are surely positive and that is, that there 

 was natural vigor behind them to a perfect finish; and so long as 

 their existence clung close to nature they were strong and prolific 

 and they continued to produce their kind and character that chal- 

 lenged all nature for vigor. 



If willing to accept the theory that the Gallus was the one origi- 

 nal of all poultry, you will find them now as strong and as vigorous 

 as it is possible for fowls to be, and to your surprise, perhaps, I can 

 tell you that some kept by Mr. Wood, of Washington, D. C, laid 

 quite as many eggs as did his other hens. To show the egg produc- 

 tion of other birds, some of them, quails, kept in confinement at 

 Storrs, Conn., laid 47 eggs and one laid 69 eggs in a season. When 

 you are told that the oi'iginal hen laid but a few eggs, think of the 

 bankivus hens and the quails that are kept so their eggs may be 

 counted. 



I trust that Mr. Barnitz will pardon my referring to his subject, 

 but it was my pleasure to visit the natural home of the turkey and 

 the prairie hen in Iowa during the early 70's. There early one morn- 

 ing I rode to the brow of a hill and in plain view I saw scampering 

 before me several thousand wild turkeys, so strong and so vigorous 

 that it took the best speed of a well-trained hunter to carry me in 

 the saddle fast enough to reach the lower end of the hill and to 

 drive the turkeys back between four of us so we could view them for 

 a short time. The oldest of them did outrun the horse, and this 

 without drooping a wing. This was the vitality that nature delivered 

 to us not so many years ago and which we have destroyed in so 

 few years. 



When a child I loved to go in the spring to visit my grandmother 

 and aunt, who lived in the hills of Jefl'erson county, Ohio; then and 

 there the turkeys and chickens did well. Two or three turkey hens 

 kept on the farm would accept the visit of the wild toms that an- 

 swered their calls and came to them. Almost every poult that was 

 hatched would live as did the young chickens and the greater part 

 of all the feed given them when young were the scraps from the 

 table and cornmeal moistened with milk and thrown to them in the 

 grass. Now, the young turkeys must have the most careful attention 

 and be coddled like hothouse plants and the greater portion of all 

 the young chicks must have equal care and attention. 



We little think of the enormous value of small things. If, per- 

 chance, each of the three hundred million hens of the United States 

 would lay three additional eggs each year the amount received for 

 those eggs at 20c a dozen would be more than fifteen million dol- 

 lars — more perhaps than all the eggs produced each year in the 

 State of Pennsylvania. This can readily be accomplished by a sys- 

 tem of culling closely and breeding for vigor. 



In one of the strongest papers written lately we found the follow- 

 ing statement: "No feeding formula has yet been produced that will 

 make a weak anemic hen lay a large number of eggs." A strong 

 vigorou?! hen, on the other hand, will lay on almost any kind of feed. 



