THE IDEAL BIRD 179 



chances. First, he may produce a lot of pullets, rang- 

 ing from very poor to very good, and carry them all 

 through the winter. Second, he may raise about the 

 same number and kind and cull sharply, carrying only 

 the strictly good through to the next year. Third, he 

 may handle his advance work so well and so intelligently 

 that he will have very little culling to do, nearly all his 

 pullets being of the grade which will pay to keep over. 

 In the first case he is doomed to pay money out all 

 winter, with infinitesimal returns. In the second, he 

 will get fair returns above expenses, if the birds were 

 early hatched. In the third instance his outgoes may 

 be large, but his income will be larger, and only in this 

 case will his hopes be fulfilled. This third method is 

 fully possible only to the one who holds control of the 

 stock which laid the eggs to produce his pullets. Cull- 

 ing properly begins with the breeding stock. In the 

 farm flock, every bird is usually a breeding bird. If 

 every breeding bird is active and vigorous, there need 

 be no cull pullets when the chicks are handled with 

 sufficient judgment and care. But if any of the breeders 

 are below par in physical vigor, no care of the chicks 

 can make them all first class. 



The rosy stories of pullets laying when fourteen to 

 twenty weeks old, so often told, become a stumbling- 

 block to all Beginners. The quick maturing Leghorns 

 and their kind should lay earlier than the Asiatics, but 

 the ideal pullet does not lay too early. In reviewing 

 the catalogue of a breeder who claims wonderful laying 

 records, I was struck with the sentence : " Not one of 

 these laid an egg before the middle of December." Run- 

 ning over the topics in " 999 Questions and Answers " 



