17 



There has been upon the market for the last few years a 

 certain grit known as Hen-e-ta, for which great claims have 

 l)een made by the company putting it out In one of their 

 circulars a statement was made that the eggs from hens fed 

 Hen-e-ta contain twice as much phosphoric acid as ordinary 

 eggs, and, therefore, hatch better. We decided to feed a lot 

 of hens on oyster shell and another lot on Hen-e-ta, in order 

 to test the claim by analyzing the eggs. Two pens of White 

 Leghorns were selected and fed for about six weeks, one on 

 oyster shell and the other on Hen-e-ta. In other respects their 

 feed was the same. At the end of the period six eggs were 

 selected from each pen and analyzed, with the following 

 results : — 



Table 10. — Analysis of Eggs. 



Per Cent of Phosphoric 

 Acid (P2O5). 



Oyster-shell 

 Eggs. 



Hen-e-ta 

 Eggs. 



Egg shells. 

 Whites of eggs 

 Yolks of eggs, 



.33 



.27 

 2.81 



It would appear from this analysis that the whites of the 

 eggs from the oyster-shell pen contained slightly more phos- 

 phoric acid than those from the Hen-e-ta pen, whereas the 

 yolks of the eggs from the Hen-e-ta pen contained slightly 

 more phosphoric acid than those from the oyster-shell pen. 

 This slight apparent difference evidently lies within the radius 

 of experimental error, so our conclusion naturally is that the 

 feeding of Hen-e-ta rather than oyster shell makes no differ- 

 ence in the amount of phosphoric acid in the eggs.^ 



It would be much more convenient for the average poultrv- 

 man were we to compound our rations on the basis of measure 

 rather than of weight, because many poultry keepers either 

 do not buy a large quantity of feed at a time, or, even though 

 they do, they may not mix it all at the same time; many of 



' Mr. H. D. Haskins, of the Massachusetts Agricultural Experiment Station, performed the 

 chemical analysis. 



