No. 4.] POULTRY HOUSING. 397 



I went to work, built a house that in several important 

 features was quite contrary to the prevailing ideas of what a 

 poultry house should be, and used it for nearly a year before 

 saying anything pul)licly about it. 



This house was a mere shell or shed ; the walls were of 

 conmion hemlock boards, laid perpendicularly on a light 

 frame, and the joints between the boards covered on the 

 back and ends of the house with common battens ; the joints 

 on the front were left open. The roof was of shingles, laid 

 on strips of furring placed three inches apart. 



The house was not tight anywhere. As I used it the first 

 winter, — it having been built in a hurry late in the fall, — 

 the battens were merely held in place with two or three 

 small nails in each, and were loose enough to let a great deal 

 of air in around them. The cracks in the boards, some quite 

 large, were not covered at all. The front of the house had 

 double doors six feet wide in each section, and these were 

 kept open all day unless a storm would beat in, and all night 

 except on very coldest nights or nights when storms would 

 drive into the doors. 



The house was built on wet ground, — that is, ground that 

 Avas thoroughly soaked by the late rains. After the roof 

 was on, the ground in the house was spaded up ; and when 

 the house, a few days later, was ready to put the fowls in, 

 the surface of the ground in it was dry, but a mere scratch- 

 ing of it would show danq) earth. By spring there was 

 about two inches of dry earth on top, and the soil damp be- 

 low that. The walls in the house were dry, — never a bit 

 of moisture on them exce})t as a driving rain might Avet 

 through the joints and cracks. This would dry out quickly, 

 and I never noticed any ill eflects from it. 



The house Avas cold, — the temperature in it was but little 

 higher at any time than that out doors ; yet going into it I 

 noticed that it always felt comfortable, Avitli a feeling like 

 Avhat you get in a warm, sheltered spot out doors, — not at 

 all like the warmth of a heated building. 



The hens always seemed as comfortable in it as I ever saw 

 hens anywhere. There Avere some fifty to sixty in it that 

 Avinter, and only two slight cases of colds, which recovered 



