132 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Feb. 15 



the collective animal heat from 25 little fluf- 

 fy botiies keeps them abundantly warm, even 

 on frosty nights. As with all other lampless 

 brooders, feeble ones, if there are any seem 

 to need a little heat on cool mornmgs when 

 all the rest are out ininning about. It is 

 made by the Park & Pollard Co., 46 Canal 

 St., Boston. Mass. It cost $1 50, and I think 

 it is worth almost that much to get the idea. 



ANOTHER "DISCOVERY." 



I told you the only rat-proof feed hopper I 

 knew of was a tall tin can that the rats could 

 not jump into nor out of, and I said such a 

 can would also bother many of the chickens. 

 Well, listen: Get a galvanized iron tub for 

 50 or 60 cts. Set it in the middle of the 

 poultry house on the ground until all your 

 chi-ikens, old and youn^, learn to go th^re 

 for feed. When they all understand it, raise 

 the tub up a little, and finally hang it by 

 three wires from the rafters overhead. If 

 your fowls have access to the house by only 

 a small door near the ground it will be a long 

 time before the sparrows find it. In warm 

 weather, when the doors and windows are 

 open, all such openings should be covered 

 wi'h inch poultry-netting. 



POULTRY SECRETS, RECIPES, NEW SYSTEMS, 

 EIC. 



I am still investing my money, and some- 

 times I get a little something valuable. Such 

 boi>ks as the Corning Egg-book, however, 

 by the Farm Journal people, are wor h five 

 times their co.->t. That is, the price is mark- 

 ed 25 cts., and it is well wortn more than a 

 dollar; while the " Mill^-r system," price $1 25, 

 is hardly worth 25 cts. — see page 718, Nov. 

 15. I sent the money for the book early in 

 November, but it did not get around until 

 about Jan. 15 :h. It is a cheip paper book 

 with but a small amount of matter (in very 

 large type) on each page. The plan for 

 warming a brooder at an expente of only 

 "X "fa cent a month " is by a manure hot- 

 bed, and I will only ask market girdeners 

 what ihey think of ketping up the heat in a 

 hotbed at the above figure. There isn't a 

 picture, not even of a poultry house, in this 

 whole $1.25 book; but there are three or four 

 very good diagrams of feed-hopper, automat- 

 ic nest, etc., in the fore part of the book. I 

 should say the things he tries to describe 

 are altog« ther too i ompl cated. I couldn't 

 make su h a hen's nest from his description, 

 to save my life. The great secret of feeding 

 a hen a who'e year for only '"Jive cents" is, 

 so far as I can understand, by selling the 

 manure for almost as much as the grain costs. 

 Where is there such a ma ket for it? The 

 way to make $60 a jear from each hen is to 

 set every egg and "work for nothintr and 

 boad yourself" If you carry out the " Sys- 

 tem "m/u//, he says you cnn niake $120 

 from each hen; and The Poultry Culture 

 Monthly, that has been giving the "Miller 

 sy>tem" such trfmendous write-ups, month 

 after month, in one place says each hen will 

 give her owner $120 000 a jear if the "sys- 

 tem " is fully carried out. I suppose the 

 figures are a misprint; but I have seen no 

 correction of it as such. Perhaps it is just 



as well to let it go that way, after all, so that 

 others may get discouraged in their ambi ion 

 to advertise (a "systt-m") something sW/ 

 bigger than any predecessor. 



Dear friends, have we not almost "sys- 

 tems " enough alreadv? How about skunks, 

 possums, hawks, etc.? 



While speaking of poultry- books I am glad 

 to say some of the incubator catalogs are ex- 

 cellent books for the beginner. The 'Arti- 

 ficial Rearing of Poultry, " just out by the 

 Prairie State Incubator Co , is worth more 

 than some of the $5.00 systems. It is written 

 by an educated and I should say Christian 

 man and tells the truth about what one may 

 expect from the poultry business. The book 

 is given away, while the "Miller System" 

 costs II 25 with its exaggerated and practic- 

 ally impossible statements. It may be urged 

 that the incubator folks have somethingj to 

 sell; but so have the Miller System people; 

 and I doubt if one man in a hundred could 

 make the Miller nest and hotbed brooder, 

 no matter how he tried, from directions in 

 the book. 



A SECRET FOR MAKING CHIPK FEED. 



James M. Brown, Pell City, Ala., adver- 

 tises a secret for 50 cts. for making a v^ry 

 superior feed for baby chicks as well as old- 

 er ones. Well, this time the recipe is good, 

 and I heartily indorse it; but, like almost all 

 the others, it is by no means new. It is sim- 

 ply to roast or parch in a sK w oven some corn, 

 wheat, Oits, Kaffir corn, sorghum seed, etc., 

 and then grind it coarsely, according to the 

 age of the chicks. I saw the recipe in 

 "Miner's Poultry Book" sixty years ago, 

 and fed my chickens parched corn ground in 

 a cof'ee-mill, and have used the snme more 

 or less ever since. By the way, if you can 

 get some nice clean grain you will find this 

 process will give you about the most delicious 

 and wholesome breakfast foodyoa ever ate, 

 and it is also the cheapest food one can live 

 on. Grini it in the little mill I have describ- 

 ed on page 30, Jan. i. The Practical Farmer 

 has recently described parching wheat be- 

 fore grinding in the little mills. Serve with 

 a bowl of milk, and see if you do not consid- 

 er it an acquisition. 



CAST THY BREAD UPON THE WATERS, FOR 



THOU SHALT FIND IT AF I ER MaNY 



DAYS.— FCC. 11:1. 



The following came as a postscript to a 

 kind letter from one of our readers now 67 

 ytars old. May God be praised fer such 

 testimony. Are there any more of the "vet- 

 erans" who received a smoker and "kept 

 the pledge?" 



It is now about 30 years since I received the gift of a 

 smoker from you, conditioned on my disrontinuing 

 the use of tobacco I have never used tobacco since. 

 I have often wondered how I could have been so self- 

 ish all those years in gratifying my own pleasure in a 

 manner so offen'ive to others from a simple want of 

 thought, for all through my long life I have always 

 been considerate of the feelings of others; but only in 

 the use of tobacco did I fail to realize the enormity of 

 my selfishness, and I have always since connected the 

 name of A. I. Root with that kindly action in days long 

 passed by. A. W. THOltNTON. 



Ferudale, Wash. 



