No. 4.] POULTRY HOUSING. 395 



to good egg production and healthy stock in winter. I 

 was constantly receiving inquiries from poultry men having 

 trouble with damp houses as to how to remedy that con- 

 dition ; and, as I visited poultry plants in winter, I al- 

 most always found the houses damp, badly ventilated, and 

 overheated about midday even of quite cold days. 



I think that in most oases conditions need not have l)een 

 bad had the poultrymen used ordinary judgment in open- 

 ing doors and windows. The common practice was to keep 

 houses closed in winter except on very bright, warm daj^s, 

 and then open them either only for a little while in the 

 middle of the day, or open them toward midda}' and leave 

 them open until dark. Very often it would happen that 

 houses were kept closed tight all day on a bright day, when 

 the sun shone warm during the middle of the day and made 

 the poultry house as warm as a green-house. Frequently the 

 poultryman kept doors and windows shut nearly all the 

 time, relying upon his ventilators to supply fresh air. That 

 the ventilation did not work as theoretically as it was sup- 

 posed to work was generally \)\iun to any one who stepped 

 into the house, — except the owner. Where the intention 

 was to ventilate by means of doors and windows, opening the 

 house up gradually in the morning and gradually closing it 

 in the afternoon, the system rarely operated as planned. 

 Such a plan, if faithfully put in practice, works well except 

 for long-continued cold weather, when the short time the 

 house may be o})ened is not long enough to thoroughly air 

 and dry it ; but I have seen very few plants on which this 

 plan of ventilation was operated as it should be. On most 

 plants it is attended to very irregularly, and often neglected 

 for days while the poultryman's time is taken up with mat- 

 ters which seem of more pressing importance. Such a sys- 

 tem of ventilating refjuires more time and attention than 

 many poultrymen are able to give it; hence, is not for them 

 a satisfactory system. 



There was no guess-work or theory about my opinion that 

 most poultry keepers would not give the ventilation of tight 

 houses the attention necessary to make them satisfactory. 

 Almost everywhere I went in winter I saw it, and found 



