10 POULTRY CULTURE 



which are staple meat foods for most healthy people, or as substi- 

 tutes for them in the diet of invalids. Thus it is cheapness and 

 quality that determine the use of poultry by those who, buying all 

 meat as they use it, are not brought to an appreciation of the con- 

 venience enjoyed by those who produce their own poultry. This 

 difference in estimates of the properties making poultry desirable 

 as food accounts for the too common failure of poultry growers to 

 understand the demand for poultry of superior table quality. The 

 grower using poultry as a staple meat and selling his surplus is 

 not as particular as to the quality of the meat as the nonproduc- 

 ing consumer to whom it is a delicacy. 



Properties of eggs. The egg the most unique of food products 

 is the only article of animal food which we have in a natural pack- 

 age. The term " hen fruit," though facetiously used, recognizes a 

 resemblance between the egg' and the large class of fruits whose 

 edible portion is protected by a covering which, as long as it 

 remains intact, is a highly effective guard against many external 

 causes of deterioration. Eggs may be kept reasonably fresh and 

 sweet in conditions and at temperatures in which meat could be 

 kept for only a short time. Easily digested, highly nutritious, con- 

 sidered as a separate article of diet they have, in even greater degree 

 than the creatures which supply them, the properties of palatability 

 and convenience. 



The most important use of eggs, however, is in combination 

 with other ingredients in the endless variety of food concoctions 

 that have been devised. While eggs for eating are often regarded 

 as a luxury, to be indulged in according to the price of eggs as com- 

 pared with other foods, eggs for cooking are generally regarded as 

 a necessity. In a close analysis of the subject, the demand for eggs 

 is seen to have a great deal of influence in determining the relative 

 popularity of the different kinds of poultry, and also to increase 

 their production, thus reducing the cost of table poultry to the 

 consumer. 



Feathers are a by-product in poultry culture, except in ostrich 

 farming, which is limited to a few localities and not extensive any- 

 where. With this exception the production of feathers for com- 

 merce is never a direct object in poultry keeping. The feathers of 

 the common kinds of poultry, when saved and sold, will, it is usually 



