(;OOD SPECIMENS OF A FAVORITE BREED 



A flock of spring-hatched Barred Plymouth Rock pullets on the Bureau of Animal Industry's 

 Experimental Farm at Beltsville, Md. The photograph was taken in the fall just as they 

 were beginning to lay. (Fig. 20.) 



in late hatched stock. From every 

 stand])oint, therefore, early hatching; is 

 profitable to the poultry raiser. 



DIFFICULTIES IN THE WAV 



So far as the question of early 

 hatching is concerned, the princij^al 

 ]^rol)lem is to }^'et the eggs properly and 

 ])nmii)tly incubated. If the poultry 

 raiser has an incubator, he will be able 

 to hatch when he pleases. If he 

 depends on hens, and has never hatched 

 early, he must get brooch' hens else- 

 where. Like egg-laying, broodiness m 

 hens is part of a cycle. Right now, f(jr 

 exami)le (February 14), the hens are 

 not broody because they are not 

 through laying, and they are not 

 through laying l)ecause they did not 



138 



begin laying early; they did not biggin 

 laying early because they were hatched 

 too late. Once we get the magic 

 circle broken and change the dates on 

 the hens, we will have plenty of broody 

 hens when we need them. The only 

 exceptions will be with the Mediter- 

 ranean breeds, the hens of which do 

 not have so great a tendency to become 

 broody as those of the American breeds. 



IS SUCCESS POSSIBLE? 



l^)ultr\^nen who have tried it, agri- 

 cultural colleges, and the U. S. Depart- 

 ment of Agriculture, are confident 

 that a concerted, systematic cfiort 

 on the part of poultry raisers would 

 help to ijrevcnt the annual fall and 

 earlv winter scarcitv of fresh eggs. 



