CHAPTER XII. 



HINTS ABOUT MANAGEMENT. 



COMMON SENSE IX THE POULTRY-YAKD. 



The "poultry" that everybody keeps are technically 

 designated " Fowls," or "Barn-door Fowls." As a rule 

 they are kept in small flocks, fed chiefly upon what no 

 farmer misses. On most farms a flock of twelve to forty 

 hens will pick up a living without receiving a particle 

 of grain from May to October, including both months. 

 Their food consists of insects, seeds, and grass or weeds ; 

 they need fresh water besides. What wonder is it that 

 fowls thus kept are demonstrably more profitable than 

 any class of stock, or any crop on the farm? 



This is the best way to keep fowls, provided they can 

 be induced to lay where their eggs can be found while 

 fresh. To accomplish tin's a house of some kind is 

 needed where the fowls may be shut in occasionally for 

 a few days at a time, so as to make them roost and lay 

 in convenient places. If fowls can roost in the trees, 

 lay all over the farm, and "dust" themselves in the 

 road, they will almost surely be healthy, lay a great 

 many eggs, and keep in good condition. Besides, every 

 now and then a hen will unexpectedly appear with a 

 brood of ten or a dozen chicks, hatched under some bush 

 where she had "stolen" her nest and done her hatching. 

 That is all very well, so far as the hen is concerned, but 

 no one wants it to. happen. We wish the hens to lay 

 and sit where we can put what eggs we please under 

 them for hatching and, what is still more important, 

 we wish to be able to collect the eggs for use or for sale 

 daily. A fresh egg is a joy, a delight, a good gift of 

 Heaven a pretty good egg is an abomination. An 

 egg, to be fit to eat, or for sale, must be fresh hnyrmd a 

 (101) 



