236 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



to hatch chickens by the thousand ? Just as I have told 

 you how to hatch them by hundreds. You must keep more 

 fowls and there will be abundance of sitters at the proper 

 season. I have probably hatched and raised more chickens 

 during the last six years than any other breeder, and the in- 

 cubator has hindered more than it has aided me. I have had 

 hatched on my place, in one week, over 1,500 chickens, all 

 with hens. That is fast enough. I i^have probably spent 

 more than $2,000 trying to convince myself tliat artificial 

 chicken production was a benefit to me, but after the long 

 struggle I haven't an incubator on my place ; still the chick- 

 ens hatch and grow. 



Farmers, if you do not care to put a part of your atten- 

 tion to the poultry, give the boys a start. Buy them good 

 stock and let them study the science of breeding. It will 

 be a benefit to them later in life in breedino; lari-er stock. 

 Let them be doing some business of their own. Build com- 

 fortable houses for their fowls and encourage them in their 

 work. They will see the reward forthcoming and will take 

 an interest in the business. Give them the use of a corner 

 of the farm, or let them use the most of it at certain seasons 

 of the j^car. It will be an advantage to your crops and they 

 will show you that the poultry is the paying crop of the 

 farm. When drouth and frosts ruin the field crops the 

 poultry will be left to pay the bills. 



The farm that I now occupy did not produce crops that 

 would sell for $100 in 1875, and in 1884 the sales from the 

 same farm will exceed ten thousand dollars; and if things 

 go onward as in the past, if the fruit trees that are now 

 young produce such crops as those that are old enough to 

 bear, the products will sell for $25,000 in 1890. 



The Chairman. Gentlemen, you have listened to one of 

 the most interesting papers of this meeting, and now there 

 is an opportunity to discuss the question which has been 

 treated in such an instructive and interesting manner by Mr. 

 Hawkins. If there are any in the audience who have any 

 questions to ask, Mr. Hawkins no doubt is as well prepared 

 to ansAVcr them as any one. 



