TESTING EGGS. 



This is a very important part of the business, 

 and if properly attended to will throw a flood of 

 light upon many perplexing problems in natural 

 as well as artificial incubation. It not only eluci- 

 dates but proves the truth or fallaciousness of our 

 theories in the line of hatching. 



Men are frequently heard to say that they never 

 bother with testing eggs. That they cannot replace 

 the unfertile eggs with others, and therefore noth- 

 ing is gained. They are told by the best authori- 

 ties that boiled eggs are not good food for chicks, 

 and as for themselves, of course they would eat 

 only fresh eggs. Then there is a risk of taking 

 out hatchable eggs ; so they run all the eggs 

 through together. They say that they can break 

 the unhatched eggs when the hatch is over, and 

 see which were unfertile and who cares whether 

 they were or were not fertile if they did not 

 hatch ? 



To those men we can only repeat. "Where igno- 

 rance is bliss 'tis folly to be wise." 



To attain the best results it is absolutely necessary 

 to test the eggs in process of incubation. If the 

 eggs all come from one farm or yard, and they 

 prove a large per cent, unfertile, weakly fertilized, or 

 stale, you will notify the party from whom you got 

 them, and he can look into the matter and rectify 

 it, if he will, and afterwards serve you with vigor- 

 ous fresh ones. If he will not do so, then you 

 can avoid him, and procure better (or worse) ones. 



35 



