108 AN EGG FAKM. 



cernedly fall to eating its own comb and wattles, if 

 allowed the privilege. This dullness or fewness of nerves 

 of feeling in the combs, when understood, may alleviate 

 the pangs felt by many persons at the mention of what 

 has been wrongly called a cruel practice. It is easier 

 for a fowl to stand dubbing than to endure a frozen comb. 



The layers are relied upon to produce the principal 

 part of the income, and as they are chief in point of 

 numbers, the detached stations where they are kept 

 form the main part of the establishment, to which the 

 breeding and sitting departments are merely tributary. 

 Most of the layers must be kept only until the age of 

 from fifteen to twenty months, and then killed for sale, 

 and their places supplied by young pullets. This course 

 is necessary, because the yield of eggs is greatest during 

 the first laying season if the hens are of an early matur- 

 ing breed, and are fed high and stimulated to the 

 utmost, as they must be to secure the highest profit. 

 For, though hens are still vigorous at two years, it will 

 be found that after a course of forcing to their greatest 

 capacity through the first season, they cannot generally 

 be made to lay profusely during the second. If we 

 chose not to put on the full pressure of diet the first 

 year, but to feed moderately high for two or three years, 

 a fair yield of eggs would be afforded during each. But 

 such a course would not pay as well as to keep pullets 

 only, and maintain a forcing system constantly from the 

 time they commence to lay until they stop, and then 

 market them before they eat up the profits in the idle- 

 ness of fall and winter. 



Pullets grow fast during the early part of their lives, and 

 give a return in flesh for what they eat then. After they 

 commence laying, their eggs are prompt dividends, and, 

 besides, their bodies increase in weight until the age of a 

 year or more. Young hens may be killed a fortnight after 

 ceasing to lay, and if they have been skillfully fed, their 



