400 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



was, as all know, a record-breaker for cold and snow. Fre- 

 quently after a night of driving storm I would go to this 

 house and find so much snow sifted through the joints at the 

 back that there was a light sprinkle of it all over the litter 

 on the floor, — so much that the hens would not come down 

 from the roost until the litter had been shaken up ; and the 

 backs of the hens as they sat on the roosts were well coated 

 with snow. The tips of the hens' combs were somewhat 

 frosted (no male was put in the house), but these hens gave 

 me about a forty per cent egg yield in January, 1904. There 

 were very few hens in any kind of house anywhere doing 

 better at that time. 



During the several winters covered by the experiments 

 mentioned my fowls were cared for by myself when at home, 

 at other times bv different members of the household, none 

 of whom had any particular interest in or skill in feeding 

 fowls. Our one rule for feedino; was to he sure that the hens 

 had an abundance. In the first half of the winter I had to 

 be away so much that I found it impossible to keep accurate 

 egg records. When I relied on others, they forgot ; and so 

 I gave up thought of making statistical figures complete, 

 concluding that circumstances limited me to general demon- 

 strations of a few leading facts, and the exact results possible 

 in cold houses and comparison of these with results in other 

 houses would have to be left to others. My trials demon- 

 strated that hens could be kept healthy and giving average 

 good egg yields in cold, open houses. So far as I could 

 judge, they (consumed no more food than when kept in warm 

 houses, though theoretically it should have re(|uired more. 



Last winter the only item of experience in my poultry 

 yard having a further bearing on this subject was the per- 

 formance of a [)cn of July-hatched Single-combed White 

 Oi"i)ingtons. These were put in an okl i)oultry house that 

 was sheathed, pai)ered and covei'cd with connnon lapped 

 sidin<r on the sides and with shinfjles on the i-oof. The front 

 of this house was about half glass, an immovable window, 

 and there was a half-window in each end, the door being at 

 the north-west corner. Th(^ growth of an api)le tree near 

 the house had forced a board from the front next the roof, 



