46 The Business Hen. 



next year, does not work out in practice. Slie should be started early 

 and kept at it. 



A hard test for a new beginner with poultry will often come in the 

 Fall when the pullets demand careful and heavy feeding and yet do not 

 lay an egg. They must be fed heavily with a fair amount of meat if we 

 expect them to lay early, and it often seems like money thrown away when 

 grain is high and funds are short. It is a good time to dispose of old 

 hens and surplus roosters while the pullets are "eating their heads off," 

 for the income from these sources helps pay the grain bill. 



THE YOUNG COCKEREL.— In many flocks the young males are per- 

 mitted to become a nuisance. They often run at large until Thanksgiving, 

 eating large quantities of grain, so that when they are finally killed they 

 have cost about all they bring. It is well understood that pigs or cattle 

 make their cheapest gain while young. We have found the cost of pro- 

 ducing a pound of pork on a pig weighing 125 pounds considerably less 

 than on the same pig when it is fed to 250 pounds. The same is true of 

 the young roosters in the average flock. The following plan of feeding is 

 followed at the Maine Experiment Station, and is much better than the 

 old method of letting the young birds run at large. 



"When the chickens are moved to the field the sexes are separated. The 

 cockerels are confined in yards, in lots of about 100, and fed twice daily on 

 porridge made of four parts of cornmeal, two parts middlings or flour, and 

 one part fine beef scrap. The mixed meals are wet with skim-milk or 

 water — milk is preferred — until the mixture will just run, but not drop from 

 the end of a wooden spoon. They are given what they will eat of this in 

 the morning and again towards evening. It is left before th.em until all 

 have eaten heartily, not more than hour at one time, after which the 

 troughs are removed and cleaned. The cockerels are given plenty of shade 

 and kept as quiet as possible. 



"We have found our chickens that are about 100 days old at the be- 

 ginning to gain in four weeks' feeding, from 1^ to 2% pounds each and 

 sometimes more. Confined and fed in this way they are meaty and soft, 

 and in very much better market condition than though they had been 

 fed generously on dry grains and given more liberty. Poultry raisers can- 

 not afford to sell the chickens as they run, but they can profit greatly by 

 fleshing and fattening them as described. Many careful tests in chicken 

 feeding have shown that as great gains are as cheaply and more easily 

 made, when the chickens, in lots not to exceed 100, are put in a house 

 with a floor space of 75 to 100 feet and a yard of corresponding size, 

 as when they are divided into lots of four birds each and confined in 

 latticed coops, just large enough to hold them. Four weeks has been about 

 the limit of profitable feeding, both in the large and small lots. Chickens 

 gain faster while young. In every case birds that were 150 to 175 days old 



