TREATMENT OF BROODY HENS. 



03 



working into her plumage of insect powder on 

 two or three occasions, or using perhaps for the 

 first the powdered sulphur treated with carboh'c 

 acid, as mentioned in a previous chapter, will 

 make her free ; or she may be fumigated as 

 described in the final chapter of this work. 

 Such a bird should not be placed on her 

 own permanent nest, however, till she will pass 

 muster, but in some other, to be afterwards 

 purified. 



Mr. J. L. Campbell, a well-known Ameri- 

 can incubator expert, found in the course 

 of his earlier experiments, quite to 

 ^th* °^ ^'^ surprise, that the heat of the 



Sitting-hen. body of broody hens varied con- 

 siderably. On introducing a clinical 

 thermometer under the breast when on the 

 nest, four hens gave readings of 98°, 102°, 103°, 

 and 105°. After a fortnight, these figures had 

 gone up several degrees. The results were 

 equally noteworthy. The hens with the 

 medium temperatures both made good hatches ; 

 but neither of the others hatched a chick, 

 though all the eggs had chicks in them. Those 

 under the 98° hen were not fully developed, 

 though some were alive ; those under the 105° 

 hen were fully formed, but all dead. He tried 

 the same two hens again and again ; they had 

 the same peculiarities in the main, and he never 

 got one live chick from either. These facts 

 suggest causes of failure other than bad nests, 

 or bad sitting, or thunderstorms, and may make 

 the use of a thermometer worth while in 

 establishments where more than one or two 

 hens are set in a season. 



Moderate-sized cross-bred hens are usually 

 good sitters. Old English Game are in the very 

 first class, and so are Dorkings if not too heavy. 

 Cochins, Brahmas, and other breeds with 

 Asiatic blood, such as Plymouth Rocks and 

 Wyandottes, make close sitters and good 

 mothers for a few weeks, but as a rule leave 

 their chickens earlier than the above. The 

 very large heavy birds are apt to crush 

 eggs and tread on chickens ; for this reason 

 Rocks and Wyandottes are preferable to 

 Cochins and Brahmas. But we always did very 

 well with the latter unless unusually large ; two 

 large hens we had, we invariably had bad luck 

 with. Some people have a prejudice against 

 trusting pullets in their first period of broodiness, 

 but we never had the slightest cause to regret 

 doing so, as we have done frequently, and early 

 pullets are generally amongst the earliest sitters 

 available. 



Of course, many hens become broody when 

 it is impossible or undesirable to let them sit 

 on eggs. In many cases, as before moult, it 



is advisable to let them have the rest of sitting 

 upon nest-eggs for a while; but often it is desired 

 to break them of the desire and obtain eggs 

 again as soon as possible. In past days of 



ignorance hens have been dipped in 

 SitUng^hens. ^old water, with an idea of cooling 



the fever of the blood ; such treat- 

 ment, besides the risk of the chill, is really 

 of little use. The proper plan is either to con- 

 fine the bird under a common basket-coop or 

 open wire pen, on the hard ground in the open 

 yard, with water by her, and where all the others 

 come round her, in full daylight but shaded 

 from the sun, and feeding the corn for the whole 

 about her coop ; or, what is perhaps better still, 

 placing her in a pen something like a fattening- 

 pen, with a bottom of slats only. This may be 

 either raised as usual, or only a few inches from 

 the ground on four bricks ; in either case she is 

 obliged to roost on a slat, as it were, and is 

 kept cool, while, as before, she should be in 

 plenty of light (but not sun) and where she 

 sees all that is going on. A few days of this 

 cool confinement will suffice in nearly every 

 case. 



30 — Nest box 



A nest for hatching should be made up, if 

 possible, on the ground, in a quiet and cool 



place, and if a little damp, all the 

 The^Hatching ^g^^er when spring has fairly set 



in. After trying many kinds, we 

 preferred to all other nest-boxes the simple 

 form shown in Fig. 30, tacked together of 

 thin boards, entirely open at the bottom, and 

 also in the front, except a strip about three 

 inches high to confine the nest material. For 

 our large Brahma hens the size on ground was 

 about 16 by 12 inches, and the open front may 

 or may not be provided with the hinged wire or 

 other open front of some kind. Scrape a slight 

 hollow in the ground within the box, or over 

 which to place it, and further bank up the 

 corners with a trowclful of loose earth or ashes. 

 Over this place a suitable quantity of clean 



