68 THE BEGINNER IN POULTRY 



that he may have an even start ? Not till this is done, 

 may you go on to that which comes next. The " next " 

 will consist of food, in variety, water, and a chance to 

 exercise ; simple enough to provide, surely. If you 

 want to save work, you can get chick scratch feeds and 

 patent cracker feeds of the supply houses ; if you pre- 

 fer to save money, you can hustle around till you find 

 stale bread not moldy at a bakery or restaurant 

 possibly, then you can buy a little bran and middlings, 

 corn meal if you wish, pin-head oats (steel cut, some 

 call it) and cracked corn, and, if you provide clean, 

 short litter for him to scratch in, the chick will grow 

 thankfully. In cold weather, use effort to make sure 

 he cannot get too cold ; in hot weather, make sure he 

 cannot get too warm. A brooder house open to the 

 south and having much glass is a trap to the Beginner. 

 Even an open shed, permitting the sun to shine fiercely 

 on a brooder with glass in the top, may bring ruin on 

 the entire brood, when the weather passes suddenly 

 from cold to hot at mid-spring. A Beginner is almost 

 sure to turn out his lamps, when he finds the brooders 

 getting much too warm. This will prove fatal when 

 night comes on too cool, and the brooder has to be 

 heated slowly while the chicks shiver. Better open it 

 up wide, turn the lamp low, but keep the brooder itself 

 warm, so that it needs only closing to be soon ready to 

 warm the chicks, when they need it. 



The real point is to have the chicks in the brooder 

 just as little as possible. For a day, perhaps, confine 

 them to the inner room ; for one or two more, according 

 to season, confine them to the outer, cooler room, en- 

 couraging them to exercise, by giving fine grains in an 



