44 HATCH EXPERIMENT STATION. [Jan. 



corn ration at the rate of .45 per hen day ; in other words, 

 100 hens would have laid 39 eggs per day on the wheat 

 ration and 45 eggs per day on the corn ration. For the 

 second period, May 13 to September 23, inclusive, the wheat 

 ration produced an average of .31 eggs per hen day, the corn 

 ration at the rate of .41 eggs per hen day ; in other words, 

 during the summer period 100 hens would have laid 31 eggs 

 per day on the wdieat ration and 41 eggs per day on the 

 corn ration. The average food cost per egg produced was : 

 for the wheat ration 1.036 cents, for the corn ration .749 

 cents, for the first period ; while for the second period the 

 cost per egg on the wheat ration was .895 cents and for the 

 corn ration .703. The gross cost of the food on the wheat 

 ration varied from about .26 cents to .37 cents per day for 

 each fowl ; wdiile on the corn ration the cost varied from .27 

 cents to .30 cents per day. The number of eggs on the 

 corn ration was considerably greater than on the other, and 

 the cost per egg was much smaller. This result is in agree- 

 ment ^vith the results of most of the similar experiments 

 which we have tried in earlier years. We are certainly 

 justified in the conclusion that corn has superior merits for 

 egg production as compared with wheat. 



2. The rations fed to the fowls in pens Nos. 3 and 4 were 

 characterized by relatively high ash and low fiber content. 

 Milk albumen was used as the source of animal food on 

 account of the low percentage of fat it contains ; and the 

 rations fed to the fowls in both of these pens were character- 

 ized ))y much lower fat content than the rations fed to the 

 fowls in pens Nos. 1 and 2. As in the first set of compari- 

 sons, the fat content of the two rations used in pens Nos. 3 

 and 4 was equalized by the addition of corn oil to the one 

 naturally lower in fat. In this experiment, as in the first, 

 wheat was the leading whole grain in the ration fed to the 

 fowls in one house (No. 3) ; corn the leading whole grain 

 used in the other house (No. 4). The results with the 

 fowls in these houses, like the results obtained in houses 

 Nos. 1 and 2, aiford a basis for estimating the relative value 

 of wheat and corn, but with a relatively low percentage of 

 fat in i)()th. The egg product in this experiment was as fol- 



