STUDIES OF POULTRY FROM THE FARM TO THE 



CONSUMER. 



INTRODUCTION". 



Until quite recently the study of the effect, of long continued low 

 temperatures on poultry and eggs was conducted by those connected 

 with the industry, and for industrial ends. Advances in the quality 

 of the product were made, but the methods of obtaining them were 

 known only to the individual or the firm experimenting, and then, 

 except where mechanical engineering was concerned, they were purely 

 empirical. Because the underlying principles of refrigeration, as 

 shown by chemical, bacteriological, and histological studies of flesh, 

 have been unknown, it has been impossible for the industry to explain 

 and remedy the varying quality of the stored products, which, though 

 entering the freezer in apparently uniform condition, differ in quality 

 after a given period of time. 



The fact that the changes undergone by poultry at temperatures 

 below freezing are of a different character from those undergone at 

 ordinary temperatures, as indicated by appearance, flavor, odor, etc., 

 has led to the assumption on the part of the industry that changes in 

 composition do not occur. The fact, too, that the changes are so 

 subtle that the best scientific methods obtainable at present are only 

 just beginning to detect them, together with the further fact that, for 

 the most part, the investigations have up to this time not gone far 

 enough to elucidate the means by which the changes noted are brought 

 about, renders the problem from both the scientific and the technical 

 viewpoint one of great difficulty as well as interest. 



The general public agitation in the United States in recent years 

 concerning " cold-stored " foods, in the sense of foods kept in a frozen 

 condition for long periods, has been productive of more scientific 

 experimentation and closer technical observation of such products 

 than has been accorded to flesh foods kept at or a few degrees above 

 the freezing point; yet the quality of perishable stuffs of all kinds 

 so kept would demand that this phase of refrigeration be studied 

 quite as thoroughly, if not more thoroughly, than the former. 



In the following review of the work in the United States on 

 refrigeration of poultry and eggs, an endeavor will be made to pre- 

 sent (1) the salient points gleaned by scientific workers from a purely 



[Cir. 64.] 



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