14 



such conditions. Elimination of losses, however, is going to 

 be a big factor when it comes to reckoning the profits. The 

 method of raising turkeys in the past has so frequently met 

 with disaster that it is now time to look for an improvement 

 of method if we are to continue to have turkey for Thanks- 

 giving and Christmas. That turkeys may on occasion be 

 raised with a turkey or common hen for a mother is quite true, 

 and the usual remark that "It saves a lot of bother" is also 

 true; but the point is not one of bother but results. 



The question now arises whether the method of isolation 

 which we propose will not yield greater profits, notwithstand- 

 ing an extra initial cost for an incubator, brooders and fencing. 

 That the reader may judge for himself (or herself), the follow- 

 ing resume is given of our experience in raising turkeys for 

 experiments during the last three summers, and also of an ex- 

 periment on a somewhat larger scale carried out on the estate 

 of Mr. Richard M. Saltonstall, at Sherborn, Massachusetts. 



Raising Turkeys at the Laboeatory. 



Summer of 1918. 



Two lots of turkeys were hatched during this season from 

 eggs incubated by hens. One hen was kept in each instance to 

 mother the turkeys hatched. 



Lot 1. — ^ Seventeen turkeys hatched June 12 from twenty- 

 four eggs. These were placed with the hen on grass between 

 buildings of the Medical School. On September 6 and 7, 

 when eighty-six days old, they were removed to a field where 

 hens had wandered to a slight extent. Two were used for 

 experimental purposes, and the fifteen remaining were sold on 

 September 21. On October 8 two of the latter were brought 

 back dead and showed blackhead. Whether they contracted 

 this from the exposure to hens prior to their sale, or subse- 

 quently, is impossible to determine. 



Lot 2. — From twenty-five eggs incubated under hens six- 

 teen tm-keys were hatched on July 14. Two of these were 

 weaklings. Three were taken by a cat, leaving eleven for ex- 

 perimental purposes. When this lot was sixty days old two 

 turkeys sick with blackhead were placed with them. Fifteen 

 days later one sickened and later died of blacldiead. The ten 



