24 HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 



make splendid incubators and rarely ever forsake the nest until their 

 brood is out. I always give my hens from sixteen to twenty eggs each. 

 This, however, will depend upon the size of the hen. 



I always let my turkeys raise their own young as it is their nature to 

 take them into the pastures and meadows where the insects, which fur- 

 nish a great part of their food, are more plentiful. Turkeys raised 

 around the poultry yard are more subject to disease than those that run 

 at large. When I raise turkeys with hens I feed them boiled milk, and 

 broken rice not cooked, lettuce chopped fine, a little bread soaked in boiled 

 milk, charcoal and oyster shells, for the first week. Then I begin to feed 

 a little ground bone; not much at first; it has a tendency to loosen the 

 bowels. Feed them rice and light bread till they are three weeks old, then 

 you can feed meal, or better still corn bread, but do not stop the rice and 

 light bread entirely until they get used to the corn bread or meal. They 

 should be fed three times a day. 



Turkeys should not be cooped up or compelled to roost on the same 

 spot each night, unless the coop be cleaned every morning and exposed to 

 sun and wind so it will be perfectly dry by night. When large enough to 

 fly up into trees, or on roosts, begin to feed them cracked corn, wheat and 

 soaked oats. When the nights grow cold in the fall insects begin to die, 

 consequently you will have to feed the turkeys more grain if you want nice 

 plump fowls to put on the market at Thanksgiving. A great many times 

 in the fall of the year you have small potatoes that are not marketable, 

 also cabbage and beets, more than you can dispose of. They are excellent 

 to feed to your turkeys. Boil the potatoes and beets, but the cabbage can 

 be fed raw. 



Sprinkle a little sulphur over your turkeys at night, if you have them 

 in a coop. The lice will not bother so much if you do this. 



Culture of Geese 



Goose eggs do not hatch -well in an incubator, 



THE Toulouse geese are the most profitable to raise; they are -an En- 

 glish breed. The bill and feet are a dark orange color. Both male 

 and female are uniform in color; heads, neck and back a dark grey, 

 breast light grey, beyond the leg to the tail they are pure white. They 

 grow very l^rge and live to a great old age. Goose raising is very profit 

 able if one will manage it right, for they need no grain in summer, but 

 they must have plenty of grass. If one would fence off an acre for geese 

 you would be surprised how many you could raise on that one acre. I 

 always set goose eggs under hens; they hatch better than with geese. I 

 never pick my geese in the laying season, but I pick the ganders all the 



