358 Reading-Course for Farmers. 



cost of a house' for laying purposes and for a trap nest. We cannot 

 give the necessary information in letters. 



Q. I. What is the best location for a poultry house? 



Ans. I. Page 278, paragraph i. *Figure 346 shows the natural 

 slope of the land selected for building the house, which provides for 

 perfect water drainage without the use of tile. The location is naturally 

 dry and sheltered. The illustration shows the natural shelter for the 

 house, provided by trees and buildings in the background. This insures 

 the building being several degrees warmer than it otherwise would be 

 because the shelter breaks the force of the prevailing wind. It faces 

 the south, which gives the greatest benefit from the sun's rays. 



Q. 2. How large a house is it best to build f 



Ans. 2. Page 279, paragraph i. Where long houses are used it 

 will be necessary to provide double yards or to remove the fowls from 

 the single yards during the early fall while the land is being fitted 

 and reseeded. The same objection applies to the colony house system 

 unless the houses are removed each year to new ground. The house 

 described is twelve feet wide and twenty-four feet long, divided into 

 two pens, each twelve feet square. The nearer square each pen can be 

 built, the less will be the cost for building material. On a large com- 

 mercial poultry plant it would be economy to build the house at least 

 fifteen feet wide, making the pens fifteen feet square. The house here 

 described is used for instructing students in the care of fowls, where 

 it is necessary to keep smaller flocks in order to accommodate a large 

 number of students. This house is but two sections of a long continu- 

 ous house to be built which will contain thirty pens, making a house 

 three hundred and sixty feet long with an overhead trolley through the 

 center of the house. By making the house continuous rather than making 

 separate colony houses, the cost is greatly reduced because it is less 

 expensive to build the partitions that divide the pens than it is to 

 build the end of each house where the houses are separate. The colony 

 houses are also much colder because they are more exposed. 



O. 3. HoK' high sJwuld a hen house be built f 



Ans. 3. Page 280, paragraph i. The house is four feet eleven 

 inches in the rear and eight feet seven inches in front, which is as low 



*The references apply to the page and paragraph of the Reading-Course Bul- 

 letin Number 16 on Building Poultry Houses, in which the principles are dis- 

 cussed. It is hoped that the readers will refer to each of the references for a 

 more detailed statement as to the reasons why the poultry house described in 

 this Supplement is ^-ecommended, 



