ioo Poultry's Place in a Rotation. 



likes the black birds and determined to breed more of them. 

 He. therefore, put his Black Leghorns in a pen by themselves 

 and bred them to a fine Black Minorca rooster. He h.as now 

 over 250 black pullets, somewhat larger than Leghorns and 

 with black legs. He has great hopes that they will prove fine 

 layers. He has no desire to grow thoroughbred birds for 

 sale all he wants is the hen that will lay the most eggs in 

 winter, and he hopes these black hens will fill the bill. 



The eggs are collected every night and an egg-record is care- 

 fully kept. In 1890, just 40,491 eggs were taken from the nests. 

 The hens average from 135 to 140 eggs per year. The best 

 average ever made on this egg-farm was 160 eggs for a flock of 

 270 hens. No incubators are ever used. These laying Leg- 

 horns are not at all anxious to sit, but enough are induced to 

 do so every year to keep up the stock of pullets. The Leg- 

 horns are better incubators than mothers. As nurses they are 

 failures, so the chicks are reared in brooders and their moth- 

 ers are requested to lay again, which request they generally 

 comply with after a little fussing. 



The hens are set in a room by themselves very much after the 

 plan described by Mr. Hales in this volume. Nests are made 

 on pieces of sod and lined with chopped hay and tobacco- 

 stems. The chicks are taken from the hen when about a day 

 old and put into warm brooders until they are large enough to 

 run outdoors, when they are placed in coops much like that 

 described by Mr. Grundy. When the chicks are large enough 

 to distinguish the cockerels from the pullets, the former are 

 taken out and sold for broilers or put in a pen by themselves. 

 The pullets run in a large field, well fed and cared for until 

 about Thanksgiving, when they are housed and pushed as 

 hard as possible for eggs. The winter's flock is generally 

 about evenly divided between pullets and two and three-year- 

 olds. Mr. Johnson considers three years the limit of a hen's 

 profitable life. The pullets are useful because they begin lay- 

 ing earlier than the old hens. Their eggs are small at first, 

 however, and would not give satisfaction if sold by themselves. 



