No. 4.] POULTRY CULTURE. 253 



Expenses: — ■ 



Feed, $34 28 



Pullets, 20 00 



Total expenses, $54 28 



Net profit or labor income, $97 49 



Net profit per hen, $6 09 



Average number of eggs per hen, 203^^ 



Failures. 



The moment one begins to talk or write about opportunities 

 in poultry culture he is sure to be asked the following question: 

 "Why are there so many failures in the poultry business?" In 

 the first place, I doubt somewhat as to whether there are any 

 more failures in poultry keeping than in other lines of work. 

 Some one, somewhere, at one time compiled statistics showing 

 that only from 3 to 5 men out of 100 are what might be called 

 business successes. If this is true, I think poultry keeping as 

 a business measures up very well with the others. 



Those who are best posted in poultry keeping do not wonder 

 at the failures there have been nor will they be surprised to see 

 many more. Just so long as people will outline projects for and 

 undertake to conduct a business of whose underlying principles 

 they are wholly ignorant, just so long there will be failures in 

 that particular business. Most of the failures in poultry keep- 

 ing have been due to one or more of the following causes: — 



1. Ignorance in regard to the amount of labor connected with 

 the business. People get an idea in some way that poultry 

 keeping requires but very little work; that all they need is a 

 house, corn and birds and the hens will do the rest. They soon 

 realize that it is like any other line of work, care and attention 

 to details being necessary to success. 



2. Distorted notions as to profits. Occasionally a man who 

 has made an exceptional profit on his hens lets it be known, and 

 at once there are hundreds who are tired of their jobs and begin 

 to annex ciphers to the results, and in a very few moments find 

 themselves almost millionaires. 



3. Lack of capital at the crucial moment. Many of the 

 would-be poultrymen who know nothing about poultry embark 



