FIE 1ST LESSONS IN POULTRY KEEPING. 



LESSON XII. 



Continuous Poultry Houses. Continuous vs. Separate 



Houses. 



SINCE the subject of this lesson was announced, so many readers about to build have 

 written me asking my opinion as to the relative merits of continuous and separate poul- 

 try houses, that I have thought it better to make the discussion of that subject preface 

 the descriptions of continuous houses, and so give those interested in them the oppor- 

 tunity 10 consider the plans and the advisability of building such plans in the light of what may 

 be said for or against the system of keeping poultry in large, long houses. 



It is undoubtedly more convenient for the poultry keeper to have his fowls all under one 

 roof or in connecting buildings in winter. It is easier and in every way more agreeable to be 

 able to pass from the grain and feed room to any and all of the buildings occupied by fowls 

 without going from under cover, and without taking more steps than absolutely necessary. 



In winter, again, for long periods, and sometimes through quite the entire winter, it may be 

 Impossible for the fowls to get out beyond such little strip of ground next their house as may 

 be kept clear of snow for them, and hence all the advantages of large yards and free range are 

 for the time inoperative. 



As far as winter poultry keeping goes, in all latitudes and localities where there is much 

 snow or mud, there is no advantage in detached, separate houses, in either of the matters 

 alluded to above, i. e., economy of labor and benefit of ample outdoor room to the fowls. 



There is, I think, but one point in which a continuous house is objectionable in winter. 

 If built as many such houses are built, without due precautions to avoid drafts and to 

 secure uniform conditions throughout the building we are very apt to have conditions of 

 temperature, dryness, etc., varying greatly within the house and in parts of it becoming 

 so unsuitable that the fowls in those pens do not do as well as the others do. This differ- 

 ence in conditions in pens in the same house is not the only cause of uneven results, but it 

 is the cause very often when not at all suspected. To test for it. If there are in a long build- 

 ing with numerous pens certain pens of fowls laying well, and others not laying well, or 

 some perfectly healthy while others either seem unthrifty or one by one contract some disease, 

 (particularly colds) though there is no reason in the stock itself or in the care given that will 

 explain the differences, try exchanging the fowls in two such pens. If, as will often be 

 the case, the pens, soon after changing places, begin to change in condition and produc- 

 tiveness you may be quite sure that the bad condition and unproductiveness are due to 

 some fault in the building. If a building is so constructed that no difficulties of this kind 

 arise in operating it, the continuous house system is, I think, without question the best sys- 

 tem for winter poultry keeping. 



