202 A^ EGG FARM. 



room in which your machine is kept is cold, and you 

 are in the arid or semi-arid region between the one hun- 

 dredth meridian and the Sierras, you will need to sup- 

 ply more moisture than the directions accompanying 

 your machine call for. Nothing in the world will 

 answer except careful trials, changing the amount of 

 water, or rather the area of your shallow moisture pans, 

 since the evaporation depends on the extent of surface 

 exposed and not on the quantity of water, according to 

 results and surrounding conditions. 



The care and skill, patience and judgment necessary 

 to run an incubator are so great that those individuals 

 possessing these qualities cannot afford to run one, as a 

 general thing. They are wanted in other employments. 

 Suppose you try what seems to be a reasonable quantity 

 of moisture for your locality and for the number of 

 rainy and foggy days that you have reason to expect at 

 the season of the year, and you get a good hatch. It 

 will not do for you to say : " Now I have found the cor- 

 rect notch and will stick to it." You can safely stick to 

 it so long as the weather remains as before, but if the 

 atmospheric conditions change, you must be governed 

 by circumstances. Yet it is said, f( a child " can run 

 the machine. The fact is, the incubator dealers know 

 that if the prospective customers were told that all is 

 not plain sailing they would in many cases lose sales. 



The hen, as we have seen, sticks to her job in cold 

 weather, and it should be observed that in windy weather 

 especially, when uncovered eggs would dry out the fast- 

 est, she broods her nest with unusual care and will 

 endure hunger and thirst for days at a time rather than 

 leave them for an instant. Who has not observed that 

 there are times when if the sitting hen is removed from 

 her charge she will immediately return in spite of a 

 bribe of unusually tempting food offered her ? Even the 

 most timid hen will at such times fight you to get back 



