POULTRY. 571 



During cold and cloudy days, and always until the chicks are a week old, the bricks 

 should be changed four or five times daily. This is no more trouble than to fill, trim, and 

 watch a lamp, and fill the tank, and is very much cheaper, while you need not fear either fire 

 or suffocation from over-heat. The brooder must be amply ventilated at the bottom, not the 

 top. This brooder I place in a little rough shed, the east and south sides of which are made 

 of hot house sash, and the floor (of rough boards) covered with road dust, and the arrange 

 ment is complete. 



The Eclipse Artificial Mother is circular in form; the heat, which is applied above the 

 chickens, comes from hot water which is contained in a covered tank inside the hover. This 

 tank is surrounded on the top and sides by an inch of thick felting, and the whole is covered 

 with a galvanized iron casing. The loss of heat is so small that the water will keep warm 

 twelve hours; so that the hover needs emptying and filling at morning and night only, a gal 

 lon or two of water sufficing to fill it. Beneath the tank hangs a fleecy blanket, against 

 which the chickens press their backs just as they do against the hen. The water is supplied 

 at the top through an inch pipe, and is withdrawn through the faucet on the side. 



If a large house is to be built, and a considerable number of chickens are to be reared, 

 it will be more convenient and economical to have a boiler introduced, together with a num 

 ber of pipes, than to have a number of single houses. Mr. E. A. Samuels says: &quot;It is not 

 best to place the chickens that are just hatched under the hovers, but to wait until they are 

 twenty-four hours old. My own practice is to remove the chickens from the incubator as fast 

 as they dry off, that is, after they have been hatched two or three hours, and place them in 

 a wide circular basket, the sides of which are lined with fur or sheepskin. From the top, 

 hanging down into the basket so as to nearly touch the bottom, is a fur or sheepskin cover, 

 and the bottom of the basket is covered with an old piece of carpet. The chickens huddle 

 together in the middle of the basket, and the fur covering rests upon their backs. The bas 

 ket should be set in a warm place near the stove. 



There are a few openings provided around the fur cover, so as to admit fresh air, or the 

 chickens would smother. In this basket the chickens remain until they are strong enough 

 to stand up, and they are then, at night, transferred to the hovers. If the circular hovers 

 are used, the young birds will get together under the middle, and there is no danger from 

 overcrowding in broods of fifty chickens; but if the pipe brooders are used, the chickens 

 should be placed under the middle of each brooder, rather than at one of the ends. 



They do not need any food for twenty-four hours after hatching, On the morning suc 

 ceeding their first night under the brooders, the chicks should be fed. Crumble up some 

 crackers fine, and mix the crumbs with the yolks of hard boiled eggs, broken up fine. 



The chicks will soon gather around the feeding dishes, if you will tap the end of your 

 finger on the side of the dish in imitation of a fowl s bill in pecking, and in a surprisingly 

 short time they will learn how to eat; you can teach them to drink also, by dipping your fin 

 ger in the water dish and stirring it a little. As soon as one chicken learns to eat or drink, 

 the others will follow its example, so that it takes but a very few minutes to teach a largo 

 number of chickens. 



After the young birds have eaten, gently push them under the brooders, and they will 

 remain quiet for a number of hours, and when they want to eat again they will run out and 

 satisfy themselves, and then return to the artificial mother precisely as they would to the 

 natural one. 



As soon as it is dark, if the hot water pipes are used as brooders, the chickens should 

 be gently pushed to the middle of the brooders; otherwise they will crowd against the sup 

 ports of the pipes or the partitions between the pens, and crush the inner ones to death. It 

 is absolutely necessary that this should be done if one expects to operate with success. 



The young broods are now started, and if they are properly cared for, there is no diffi- 



