The Health of the Hen. 101 



TREATMENT OF YARDS.— Manure from healthy fowls will so 

 pollute small yards as to make them unhealthy and render cultivation of 

 the soil necessary. It is not likely that even disease germs would outlast 

 the attacks of the soil bacteria throughout a season when the ground is 

 properly spaded or plowed and cultivated. The uncleaned hen roost has 

 been called the greatest meance to the hens, but probably the yards and the 

 water furnish the larger part of the infection. Yards which are virtually 

 fields and can be cultivated for various crops in succession furnish the 

 best facilities for the hen and are the healthiest. By locating the houses 

 at the touching corners of four fields the fences can easily be arranged 

 so as to use either at will. The portable house has its sanitary value in 

 the warm months. The turning under of polluted soil and removal of the 

 fowls during the cultivation of a crop renew the fields so that they can be 

 used alternately year after year to the advantage of both crop and fowls. 

 Newly hatched and small chicks must be yarded somewhat diffierently from 

 old fowls. For these in Spring and Summer there is no better place than 

 seme spot within the orchard which has been enclosed by a three-foot inch 

 mesh net wire fence, with lower edge buried in the ground. This will 

 keep them from being lost in the wet grass. 



BROODING TROUBLES.— The diseases of brooding are mainly those 

 which arise from the lack of heat and food, the former by far the more 

 important. The result of brooding by the hens is the application of heat 

 to the chick, and when food is plenty the hen that is most successful is the 

 one that has paid the strictest attention to business. So in artificial brood- 

 ing success depends upon the application of heat. When disease occurs 

 in hatching and brooding artificially it is in most cases directly due to 

 the lack of heat or its improper application and not to the stock from 

 which the eggs came. The success of artificial brooding will depend upon 

 the brooder and its treatment. Artificially raised chicks being deprived 

 of the hen's care learn but slowly and must be housed and yarded for some 

 time. There need be no worry about chicks contracting such diseases as 

 gapes if they are kept from other fowls and on uninfected runs. It is 

 safer and more economical of labor to brood the chicks until they are 

 four or five weeks old even in Summer. 



ROUP. — Bacterial diseases which show their main symptoms in the 

 head are known as roup, the nostrils become stopped by inflammation and 

 inflammatory products, the mucous sacs of the eye socket become filled 

 and often cause the head to swell and the eye to project. An examination 

 of the nasal opening in the roof of the mouth often shows a yellow cheesy 

 deposit. These discharges have a characteristic odor of dead tissue. The 

 cheesy deposits also extend to the opening of the windpipe. When the 

 breathing becomes obstructed the fowl emits a gasping noise which gives 

 rise to the name roup. It is probable that there are no less than three, 



