1909 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



Ml 



Poultry 

 Department 



By a. I. Root. 



THE DOLLAR HEN; A NEW UP-TO-DATE POUL- 

 TRY-BOOK. 



In our issue for May 1 I spoke of a valuable 

 bulletin sent out by the Department of Agri- 

 Ciilture in regard to the egg trade of the 

 United States. This bulletin was received 

 with great favor, not only by poultry-jour- 

 nals but by the agricultural papers general- 

 ly. Some of the poultry-journals considered 

 it of so much value that they copied it en- 

 tire. Well, this bulletin was the work of 

 Milo M. Hastings, formerly Poultryman at 

 the Kansas Experiment Station, and later in 

 charge of the poultry investigation of the De- 

 partment of Agriculture; and this new book 

 that is just out is by that same man. It con- 

 tains something over 215 pages of rather fine 

 print; and my estimate is that this book con- 

 tains more sound solid sense of real value to 

 the poultry-keepers of the world than any 

 thing else that has ever come to us in print. 

 The book is not illustrated, as I think it 

 should be, and it does not go into detail as 

 many of the other poultry-books do; but it 

 draws a sharp and clear line between good 

 common sense and nonsense. It is a scientific 

 work, and it comes before the poultry-keep- 

 ers in the way our experiment stations come 

 before our farming people — not only with 

 authority based on up-to-date science, and 

 with no bias in favor of anybody nor for any 

 particular thing. 



With this preface let me make some ex- 

 tracts from the book. It opens up this way: 



Twenty-five years ago there were in print hundreds 

 of complete treatises on human diseases and the prac- 

 tice of medicine. NotwithstandinK the size of the 

 book-shelves or the hich standing- of the authorities, 

 one mieht have read the entire medical library of that 

 day and still have remained in ignorance of the fact 

 that outdoor life is a better cure for consumption than 

 the contents of a drugstore. The medical professor of 

 1885 may have gone prematurely to his grave because 

 of ignorance of facts which are to-day the property of 

 everj' intelligent man. 



There are to-day on the book-shelves of agricultural 

 colleges and public libraries scores of complete works 

 on " Poultry," and hundreds of minor writings on va- 

 rious phases of the industry. Let the would-be poul- 

 tryman master this entire collection of literature, and 

 he is still in ignorance of facts and principles, a knowl- 

 edge of which in better-developed industries would be 

 considered prime necessities for carrying on the busi- 

 ness. 



The reader who is looking for information concern- 

 ing fancy breeds, poultry shows, patent processes, pat- 

 ent foods, or patent methods, will be disappointed, for 

 the object of this book is to help the poultryman to 

 make money, not to spend it. 



What do you think of the above as a start- 

 out? About a year ago I criticised a new 

 poultry-book from a college professor in the 

 West because he did not seem to have any 

 comprehension of the new things that have 

 recently come up in the poultry business; 

 but the Dollar Hen touches on every thing 

 that is being tried and mentioned in our 

 poultry literature. There has been quite a 

 little discussion in regard to fireless brood- 



ers and the Philo system. After discussing 

 the matter of brooders he closes with the 

 following: 



Curtis Bros, at Ransomville, N. Y., who raise some 

 twenty thousand chicks per year, have adopted the 

 following system: The chicks are kept under hovers 

 heated by hot-water pipes for one week, or until they 

 learn to hover. Then they are put in Philo boxes for 

 a week in the same building, but away from tlie pipes. 

 The third week the Philo boxes are placed in a large 

 unhealed room. After that they go to a large Philo 

 box in a colony house. 



You see, instead of deciding the matter 

 for himself he tells what a big institution has 

 decided on — a place where they raise 20,000 

 chickens a year; and from what experience 

 I have had with lampless and other brood- 

 ers I should say the Curtis brothers are just 

 about right in the matter. 



After the above he gives the following di- 

 rections for making a fireless brooder: 



To make a Philo box of the Curtis pattern, take a box 

 5 in. deep and 18 in. to 24 in. square. Cut a hole in one 

 side for a chick-door; run a strip of screen around the 

 inside of the box to round the corners. Now take a 

 second similar box. Tack a piece of cloth rather loose- 

 ly across its open face. Bore a few auger-holes in the 

 sides of either box. Invert box No. 2 upon box No. 1. 

 This we will call a Curtis box. It costs about 15 cents, 

 and should accommodate fifty to seventy-five chicks. 



In regard to the latest investigations in 

 regard to incubators he gives the following: 



The writer has long been of the conviction that a 

 plan which would keep the rate of evaporation within 

 as narrow bounds as we now keep the temperature 

 would not only solve the problem of artificial incuba- 

 tion, but improve on nature and increase not only the 

 numbers but the vitality or livabi'ity of the chicks. 



In regard to turning and cooling the eggs 

 in incubator work, I quote as follows: 



In incubation practice it is highly desirable to change 

 the position of eggs so that unevenness in temperature 

 and evaporation will be balanced. When doing this 

 it is easier to turn the eggs than not to turn them, and 

 for this reason the writer has never gone to the trou- 

 ble of thoroughly investigating the matter. But it has 

 been abundantly proven that any particular pains in 

 egg-turning is a waste of time. 



COOLING EGGS. 



The belief in the necessity of cooling eggs undoubt- 

 edly arose from the effort to follow closely and blind- 

 ly in the footsteps of the hen. With this idea in mind, 

 the fact that the hen cooled her eggs occasionally led 

 us to discover a theory which proved such cooling to 

 be necessary. A more reasonable theory is that the 

 hen cools the eggs from necessity, not from choice. 

 In some species of birds the male relieves the female 

 while the latter goes foi'aging. 



Eggs will hatch if cooled according to custom; but 

 that they will hatch as well or better without the cool- 

 ing is abundantly proven by the results in Egyptian 

 incubaters, where no cooling whatever is practiced. 



He has quite a chapter on the diseases of 

 poultry; but before he goes into it he gives 

 us a paragraph of good sound sense. See 

 what you think of it: 



For the study of the classification and description of 

 the numerous ailments by which individual fowls pass 

 to their untimely end, I recommend any of the numer- 

 ous books written upon the subject. Some of these 

 works are more accurate than others, but that I consid- 

 er immaterial. The study of these diseases is good for 

 the poultryman, it gives his mind exercise. When a 

 boy in high school I studied Latin for the same pur- 

 pose. 



The author recommends hopper feeding, 

 or an arrangement for hopper feeding that 

 will let each individual fowl select from the 

 different hoppers so as to make a balanced 

 ration, which I agree with exactly. 



