131 
tention a heavily infested 15-acre field was cleaned of grubs by giving 
poultry the run of the field during cultivation. Another instance of the 
value of chickens in this connection was called to our attention by Mr. 
Frank Acker, of/ Middleton, Wis., whose potato crop was practically 
destroyed by grubs in 1912 excepting the part near the farm buildings, 
where the chickens had the run of the field. When sod is loose because 
its roots are cut off by grubs, chickens will scratch it away in their search 
for the insects much as do turkeys. When the beetles are abundant, on 
nearly every farm the chickens may be seen searching for May-beetles 
beneath the trees. 
Portable poultry houses, which can be transferred to any particular 
field or part of a field as it is being plowed or cultivated, were used in 
Fic. 46. Thorn-headed worms (Gigantorhynchus 
hirundinaceus) attached to piece of pig's 
intestine: +, male; ¢, female. Enlarged. (Re- 
drawn from Ransom, Yearbook U.S. Dept. 
Agr., 1905.) 
Europe over fifty years ago. Such houses, according to M. Maurice 
Girard (30), should have a capacity for 100 to 200 chickens, and should 
contain perches, numerous egg-laying compartments, and a receptacle 
to catch the manure. The chickens forage about the house during the 
day, returning at night, and a continuous ration of grubs has no percep- 
tible effect on the taste ot the eggs as does a continuous ration of certain 
lepidopterous larvae. 
Rarely dogs have been trained to follow the plow and pick up beetles 
and grubs (17). At Washington, Ind., April 16, 1915, Mr. D. G. Tower, 
