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STOCKING THE FARM IT'S THE MAN WHO COUNTS. 



(Arthur A. Hunter, Merchantsville, N. J.) 



I believe the most economical way to stock the plant is to buy the 

 eggs, hatch and rear the chicks. The owner should go to some large 

 poultry plant which breeds the variety he has selected (and he should 

 select but one variety) and contract three thousand eggs to be de- 

 livered as desired. As to quality, it should be as good as his pocket 

 will allow. He should pay at least $6.00 per one hundred, and in re- 

 turn should get eggs that would usually sell for more on account of 

 giving so large an order. My reason for advocating one variety and 

 insisting on good quality is that I believe more money can be made 

 out of poultry by working all branches of the business, not only by 

 marketing poultry, broilers, capons, strictly fresh eggs, but by breed- 

 ing stock, hatching eggs, baby chicks at the same time, and by se- 

 lecting one variety and giving all his attention to that one variety, 

 he eventually becomes identified with it, and if he has a local market 

 he will find the demand will be greater for his market poultry or 

 market eggs. They will command better prices from the fact that 

 they have a reputation. 



THE LAYING AND BREEDING HOUSE. 



The laying and breeding houses which are shown on drawing may 

 be built for $300.00 each, and will accommodate fifty hens in each 

 compartment or pen, or three hundred and fifty in each house. The 

 house is built of pine or hemlock. The ends and back should be of 

 well-seasoned lumber, planed on the outside and ship-lapped. The roof 

 may be ordinary one-inch boards covered with one of the many good 

 roofing materials, preferably rubberoid. The length over all is one 

 hundred and seventeen feet, twelve feet being allowed at the end for 

 a feed house. The width is fifteen feet with shed roof eight feet high 

 in front and five feet in the rear. The house is divided into seven 

 pens fifteen feet square, which allows two hundred and twenty-five 

 square feet for each pen; double doors which swing both ways are 

 located in each partition next the front, allowing the attendant to go 

 through the house from one end to the other for the purpose of 

 carrying feed or cleaning out droppings. 



Each pen has a front opening eleven feet long by five feet high, 

 filled with three frames hinged at the top and covered with extra 

 heavy one-inch mesh wire netting and muslin in winter. The one- 

 inch wire keeps the sparrows out. The dropping boards are three 

 feet wide and are in two sections, hinged at the back, so that they 

 can be raised and hooked to the roof when whitwashing, as this 

 is the place to look for mites. Small pillars of six or eight bricks each 

 support the house; set five feet apart under the sills. 



USE IT AS A BROODER HOUSE ALSO. 



The brooding is done in one of the laying houses. One house, or 

 a part of it, is Jaken each year in rotation, in that way giving the 



