APRIL 1, 1913 



241 



Poultry Department 



FORTY-EIGHT CHICKS FROM FIFTY EGGS IN A 

 FIFTY-EGG INCUBATOR. 



Some of the friends in times past have 

 called me a Jbungler with poultry. I think 

 it was the friend, however, whose scheme 

 or " system " had been exposed. Well, I 

 have been a bungler, and I don't know hvd 

 I am a bungler somewhat yet; but this 

 morning, this 11th day of February, 1913, 

 I have taken forty-eight good strong chicks 

 from fifty fertile eg'gs. Now, I might make 

 it a little better than that, I think, when 1 

 explain that, in testing the eggs, there was 

 one of the fifty that I threw out as doubt- 

 ful. Let me tell you how I mark eggs that 

 are doubtful. I just put a cross on the 

 large end. If, after further testing, how- 

 ever, I found these crossed eggs are fertile 

 after all, I put a circle around the cross, 

 and that means the cross reads " naught '" 

 or " nothing." You may wonder how I get 

 fifty fertile eggs in a fifty-egg incubator. 

 J do it this way : For the first three days I 

 stand them on the small end. In this way 

 I can get sixty or sixty-one eggs in the 

 average fifty-egg incubator. Of course, 

 during the first three days these eggs can't 

 be rolled around very much, as they stand 

 on the small end. I think I have explained 

 before that in this way I manage to have 

 fifty fertile egg's, as a rule, to fill a fifty- 

 egg incubator. Now, this report doesn't 

 amount to very much unless I can do it 

 again, and can show some of the rest of 

 you how to manage to get equally good 

 hatches. I am not sure that 1 can do this; 

 but I can tell you briefly how I manage. 

 It comes up like this — to whom or where 

 does the credit belong? Is it to the man 

 who furnished the incubator, or is it because 

 of the favorable season, or because I have 

 taken pains to have my eggs well and 

 strongly fertilized! or has your humble 

 servant some credit in the matter? I have 

 explained before how I gave two males to 

 my forty-eight laying hens. I told yon 

 when I started down to Florida that I was 

 going to use an electric incubator; but when 

 1 got here I found out they hadn't gov 

 around to giving us a current for the whole 

 twenty-four hours, so the electric incubatoi" 

 couldn't be used until somewhere near the 

 first of February. As I didn't want to lods 

 so much time I sent for one of the $7.00 

 fifty-egg incubators made by the Buckeye 

 Incubator Co., of Springfield, Ohio. I have 

 taken out three hatches this winter wit!', 

 this machine before the one that has jusi 

 now given such excellent results. I followed 

 exactly the directions that came with the 

 machine, with the exception of letting the 



chickens all remain in the machine until 

 the 22d day. I removed them just after 

 dinner from the machine on the 21st day. 

 They commenced coming out on the 20th, 

 so that a greater part of them were nearly 

 or quite twenty-four hours old when I took 

 them out of the incubator. My reason for 

 removing them a little sooner is this. Every 

 time I take off a hatch I find a great quan- 

 tity of fuzzy down, that has rubbed off from 

 the chickens, down among the eggshells in 

 the incubator. Sometimes there will be a 

 good double handful of tliis down (especi- 

 ally where there is a large hatch) down in 

 the botoom of the incubator. Now, I figure 

 this must be somewhat of a loss, because 

 chickens, especially when taken from the 

 hot incubator, and jjlaced right out almost 

 in tlie open air, as I do liere in Florida, 

 need every bit of their feathery down to 

 protect them from the breeze and the 

 weather. As they seemed quite restless, and 

 evidently in want of more air, I decided to 

 take them out, as I told you, on the after- 

 noon of the 21st day. Well, after taking 

 out forty-four I discoverd there were four 

 more that were hardly ready to come out. 

 One of tliem was just out of the shell, and 

 three more were only partly out. One of 

 the shells was just pipped. I dipped these 

 partly hatched eggs in water about as hot 

 as I could bear it with my hand, and then 

 put them back in the incubator on a wet 

 cloth wrung out. This was to supply what 

 moisture or dampness was lost when the in- 

 cubator door was opened. Now, I haven't 

 very much faith in helping chickens out of 

 their shells, although in one of my hatches 

 I helped two out that seemed so feeble and 

 in such bad shape that I had no hopes that 

 they would ever live, or amount to any 

 thing if they did live. However, I did the 

 best I could with them, washing off the glue 

 that had dried on to them with hot water, 

 then putting them back in the incubator, 

 and awaiting developments until next morn- 

 ing. The next morning they had improved 

 so greatly that I kept them a little longer, 

 and finally put them out with the rest of 

 the hatch, intending to keep watch and put 

 them back in the incubator if necessary. 

 To my great surjjrise, however, after twen- 

 ty-four hours had jjassed I had great diffi- 

 culty in finding the two chickens that I 

 helped out of the shells, and since then I 

 have never been able to tell one from an- 

 other. They are all just alike. This was a 

 thirty-six chick hatch, and they are all alive 

 and well now, just three weeks since thej' 

 came out of the shell. 



Now, as two of the chickens seemed to be 



