108 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



number of Leghorns than you can Brahmas or White Wyan- 

 dottes or Plymouth Rocks. Very active fowls can get so 

 much exercise in the daytime that they can get along in 

 smaller quarters at night, especially if they have an open 

 house or open cracks on one side. I do not believe in close 

 houses. Fowls can stand cold air all right. It is draughts 

 they do not like. If you shut them up tight, they get 

 tender and take cold easily. If you feed very hot messes 

 it has the same eifect. I do not believe in either. You get 

 more eggs, but more risk. I like to get rid of all chance 

 of disease that is possible, even if I do not get quite the 

 profit. 



The farmer I mentioned has one hundred houses and 

 keeps three thousand fowls. They have just ordinary board 

 houses, without any matched boards, but they batten the 

 cracks on the sides, so there is no draught over them. Of 

 course he is a little nearer the sea than this is. There is 

 a man in New Hampshire who keeps three thousand in 

 houses like a tent, and one end is open all winter. It is 

 better to have them exposed to cold winter air than to have 

 them shut up and not have all the air they want. 



Mr. Hall. Would you let poultry go on the ground, 

 whether there is any snow there or not ? 



Mr. CusiLviAN. I think if there was a heavy snow I 

 should let them stay in the house. I think, if you can dig 

 five or six feet square in front of the house, it is very de- 

 sirable. I do not like to have them on the snow. In New 

 Hampshire they have snow so that the hens have to stay in 

 weeks at a time. 



Question. Would the shed houses be better than houses 

 in the side of a hill ? 



Mr. CusHMAN. If you can keep them from getting damp, 

 such houses are very good. I have seen a great many fowls 

 kept in that way, and I think they lay better if partly 

 underground in the coldest weather, if it is perfectly dry, 

 than they do above ground. I think you get more eggs 

 when eggs are highest if partly underground. But if water 

 is going to come in and wet the floor, and you keep Leg- 

 horns, you are going to get into trouble. 



Mr. . I know a poultryman who builds cheap houses 



