1909 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



717 



poultry-netting to keep the "varmints" 

 iroin catching the little chickens. The big 

 ones will roost in the trees, and do all right. 

 Now, with all of these wonderful facilities 

 for producing chickens and eggs, there is 

 not a poultry journal at the present time in 

 the whole State of Florida. If I am making 

 a mistake I hope somebody will make haste 

 to set me right. Furthermore, there is not 

 a single person, so far as I can learn, who 

 advertises baby chicks for sale. Mr. John 

 H. Draime, of Monticello, Fla., has just writ- 

 ten me, incjuiring where he can purchase 

 baby chicks, and some parties have to my 

 knowledge sent away up here to the cold 

 bleak North, and let the baby chicks take a 

 journey of two or three days, and may be 

 four, without a scrap to eat or a drop of 

 water to drink. Yes, they get through alive, 

 but it is positively "cruelty to animals." 



When I first introduced Grand Rapids let- 

 tuce grown in Grand Rapids, Mich., they 

 were growing lettuce in the greenhouses 

 away up there in the North and shipping it 

 down to Cincinnati, and it seems to me 

 somebody said they had sent this lettuce 

 clear down to New Orleans. Did you ever? 

 Up in wide-awake and progressive Michi- 

 gan they build expensive glass structures so 

 as to keep out the zero weather, and then 

 ship their produce down to the southern 

 cities, where no frost ever hinders the rais- 

 ing of any thing. Now, who is there in that 

 great and beautiful State of Florida who will 

 go into the baby-chick business and take 

 care of it? Of course, it takes time to 

 build up a trade. Somebody who has al- 

 ready a reputation for fair dealing in poultry 

 will be the one to undertake it. We learn 

 by the Petaluma Weekly that the baby- chick 

 business has assumed such dimensions in 

 California that every one who undertook it 

 last year was literally swamped with orders. 

 I presume they are just now doing a big 

 business in that line, and there is no reason 

 in the world why Florida should not be do- 

 ing the same. 



Now wake up, you "chicken chaps," 

 down in that beautiful climate, and let the 

 world know the possibilities of the Florida 

 climate. Why, only a little time ago some- 

 body told me that in the city of Tampa they 

 had to send away up to Georgia for "spring 

 chickens." The chicken-men around in that 

 region could not raise them fast enough to 

 supply the market. By the way, prices for 

 both eggs and chickens are usually as high 

 there (or higher) as in the frosty North. 



OATS WITHOUT " SPROUTING "i FOR LAYING HENS; 

 I.MPORTANT TESTIMONY. 



Mr. A. I. Root:— I have read your writiriKs for many 

 years with pleasure, and 'I trust i some profit. While 

 not a professional poultryman, I derive some profit 

 from a bunch of fowls. You seem to be irettinjr on the 

 riirht track in reifard to the hoppcr-feedinir plan, July 

 1. .My best results in hopper feeding have been se- 

 cured by feedinir oats alone, and. durinir cold weath- 

 er, while the fowls were confined, civintr all the rock 

 crystal irrit they wanted. In the winter of li)07 I had 

 52 Rose Comb Khode Island Reds, June pullets, on a 

 diet of oats alone. They laid 98 dozen eirifs in Febru- 

 ar>-, 1899; 10 in March. 1897; 3 in April, confined in a 

 12x20 buildinu'. In 1908 1 had no oats to spare, so I 



bought mixed grains and a bone-cutter, and did a lot 

 of work and got far less results. In feeding the oats 

 alone, the fowls never fill their crop full; but they 

 also seldom pass the feeder, but stop and pick once or 

 twice, and go on. I never soaked any oats for them, 

 but kept clean water before them all the time, and let 

 them do their own soaking. If I were going to feed 

 any corn or wheat with the oats I would not mix them 

 in a feeder, but fill the feeder with oats, and give the 

 wheat or corn at night alone. If it is mixed with oats 

 the fowls will sort most of it out and not eat oats 

 enough. Oats seem to contain about the right ele- 

 ments, and in about the right proportion, to make a 

 full feed for any animal, from a hen to a man. I give 

 you this for what you may be able to get out of it. I 

 like to get a lot of ideas, and sort them over in my 

 mind. J. A. Crane. 



Marion, N. Y., Aug. 2. 



It would seem that not only sprouted oats 

 but oats without sprouting are a good feed 

 for laying hens, and I have been feeding them 

 off and on for some time past by simply soak- 

 ing themover night instead of sprouting them; 

 but the above suggests a plan that is still less 

 trouble. As we have an automatic watering- 

 device I think I will go at once and put a pail 

 of oats right beside the place where the 

 fowls drink; then they can do their own soak- 

 ing. One thing that troubles me about feed- 

 ing oats is that the hens pull them over and 

 scatter so much of the feed over the ground 

 without eating it at all. These oats that they 

 discard have either no grain inside or else a 

 very small one. When they are forced to it, 

 they will sort out these poor or imperfect 

 grains; but if fed in a hopper where they can 

 help themselves it seems they waste a great 

 lot of it. If I understand you, you would 

 give them oats only, in a hopper; and with 

 this feed a quantity of corn and wheat, say 

 once a day or oftener. 



THE BEE-ESCAPE FOR CHICKENS— MORE ABOUT 

 IT. 



Although my picture on page 4?: 3, Aug. 1, 

 illustrates about the simplest "escape " that 

 can be made, I am glad to notice that several 

 periodicals have taken the matter up. The 

 publishers of Suburban Life for June had a 

 very pretty illustration of the whole matter, 

 and they have been kind enough to let me 

 have the cut for the benefit of our readers, 

 as below. 



THE HEN'S GATE. 



Hens get out of the hen-yard one way or another, 

 but they seldom are able to get back into the yard. 



They will walk 

 along the fence 

 pecking it with 

 their bill. Having 

 seen my hens do 

 this for some time, 

 I built a little gate 

 which opened in 

 and which was not 

 hung quite plumb, 

 so that its own 

 weight would close 

 it without the use 

 of a spring. It was 

 8x 12 inches, just 

 big enough for a hen to go through comfortably, and 

 still not so heavy but that, when the hen picks it with 

 her bill, it will swing open a little. She immediately 

 pokes her head through, and the weight of her body 

 opens the gate enough to allow her to pass through. 



P. M. J. 



Remember that all these devices can be 

 used to permit the laying hen to go in on her 

 nest; and after she has laid an egg it can be 



