1909 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



715 



Poultry 

 Department 



By a. I. Root. 



STILL MORE " DISCOVFRIES." 



Yes, I am making lots of progress with my 

 new incubator and chickens. My discover- 

 ies may not be exactly new to the great 

 Foultry world, but they are new to me, and 

 think they are to most of you. I have been 

 very curious to know exactly how the chick 

 gets out of the shell. We used to read in 

 books that the mother hen assists the chick 

 in working its way and getting out into the 

 world ; but 1 guess all are agreed now that th is 

 is only fiction. I think it has been suggest- 

 ed, too, that the chick breaks the shell when 

 it gets developed to such an extent that it 

 enlarges enough to grow, and bursts the 

 shell; and I believe this is partly true. But 

 the fact remains, however, that, when every 

 thing goes on as it should go, the chick 

 breaks away the shell clear around so that 

 the shell separates into two pieces — the 

 smaller part coming off very much as the 

 cap comes off from tne cell of a worker-bee. 

 The bee gnaws clear around until the top 

 lifts up like the lid of a tea-pot, the cap often 

 hanging, as it were, hingea like the tea-pot 

 lid. Well, when every thing is right with 

 the hatching of an egg, it opens up some- 

 thing like that. Now, how does the chick 

 cut the egg so as to make a ring clear around? 

 It must turn around in the shell. I think we 

 have read that it does it by repeated strokes 

 of its bill; but 1 have tried in vain to hear 

 the strokes. I have repeatedly held eggs up 

 to my ear when the chick was part way 

 around, but I never could hear any thing. 

 Let me digress a little. 



If you want to watch a sitting hen to see 

 how she manages about rolling and coolina 

 her eggs, you will have to be very sly and 

 careful; for she will not g6 through with the 

 performance when she is aware that anybody 

 is watching her, and she is pretty sharp and 

 sly about it. When I placed the sitting hen 

 in a box near my pillow I went to sleep with 

 my ear against the side of the box; it was an 

 hour or more before she became accustomed 

 to things so she would go to moving her eggs 

 around. When a young pullet goes on the 

 nest to lay she sometimes stays on the eggs 

 an hour or more, especially with her first 

 egg; and if nobody is near to hinder her by 

 his prying eyes, she usually busies herself 

 during this hour by picking up straws and 

 placing them around her nest, making it 

 look like a shapely built bird's-nest; but if 

 she catches a glimpse of your inquisitive 

 eyes over her back, or from any other point 

 of view, she stops her work at once, and re- 

 mains as "mum " as can be. 



Well, now, this chick coming out of the 

 shell is easily embarrassed in the same way. 

 If there is any noise or disturbance it ceases 

 work. In order to watch the process, I re- 

 moved the whole top of the egg-shell, where 



the air-bubble is, without breaking the white 

 delicate membrane. I have done this several 

 times, and I can see the movement of the 

 chick under this membrane. Well, when- 

 ever there is any jar or disturbance it stops 

 work. Just recently I placed some hatching 

 eggs against the cloth-cover side of my in- 

 cubator. Then I slipped up very quietly 

 and placed my ear against the cloth, and I 

 distinctly heard the chick cutting or break- 

 ing the shell; and what surprised me was 

 that its strokes were almost as regular as the 

 ticking of a watch; even though the top of 

 the egg was entirely removed, it took no ad- 

 vantage of this. It cut out its regular circle 

 just the same. Sometimes when the cell is 

 very thick, and the membrane also, I think 

 the chick lacks strength and perhaps energy 

 enough to break its way out into the world; 

 and I believe a little encouragement some- 

 times is a help.* But the only form of en- 

 couragement that has ever commended itself 

 very much to me is to have some other 

 chicks hatching at the same time (of course 

 this is almost invariably the case) , and when 

 it hears them chirp it seems to give it enthu- 

 siasm for its work. 



Now, you would think that one chick chirps 

 just like another. Not so. There is as 

 much difference in the tones of their voices 

 as in the voices of human beings; and it is 

 just beautiful music to my ear to hear the 

 succession of chirps from chicks that are 

 not yet out of the shell. Some will be on a 

 high key, and some low; and they seem to 

 answer each other. After they get free from 

 the shell, and tumble down against that hot 

 boiler covered with flannel, they seem to be 

 just where they ought to be. As 1 have said 

 before, they dry out and get handsome in a 

 surprisingly short period of time. 



The first hatch from my newly invented in- 

 cubator, as described in the last issue, was 

 only five chicks from ten eggs. One reason 

 for it was that I put the ten eggs in the incu- 

 bator before I had learned to handle it. It 

 is one thing to invent a machine, and it is 

 often quite another thing to learn how to 

 manipulate it. Ask the Wright brothers 

 what they think about this statement. 



Well, without a thermostat my incubator 

 had a rather big range from high to low. 

 The principal trouble was because the oil I 



* For a time I was considerably taken up with the 

 Philo method of helping chickens out of the shell 

 where they seemed unable to get out themselves; but 

 after quite a little experience during the summer with 

 my incubator work I decided I made mischief by tak- 

 ing them out of the shell before they were ready, as 

 many times or more than I helped the chicken that 

 could have never gotten out. If the chick is helped 

 out a little too soon it may live, it is true; but it ought 

 not to come out until it has fully absorbed and taken 

 up all the liquid inside of the shell so as to come out 

 dry and clean. When the egg is pipped, and you wait 

 24 hours, and the chick does not seem to be making 

 progress, you naturally think it needs a little help; 

 but how are you to be sure it would not have gotten 

 out all right without help? It is like taking medicine. 

 Did the medicine cure you, or would you have gotten 

 along just as well lor may be better) without any med- 

 icine at all? Who can answer? Now, I may change 

 my mind after further experiment, but at present I 

 very much doubt whether it pays to try to help chick- 

 ens out of the shell. 



