CHAPTER IV. 



FEEDING FOR TWO HUNDRED EGGS A YEAR. 



We now have our hens in a dry, warm, sunny and sanitary 

 house, have supplied them with facilities for keeping clean, and 

 of course want them to lay. What shall we feed and how much ? 

 This is an important question, for unless a hen is supplied with 

 material for egg production she cannot lay. She can no more 

 produce eggs without the proper food than a factory can turn out 

 the finished product without raw materials. What shall we feed 

 and how much shall we feed, therefore? 



Let us again fdllow Lord Bacon's advice and interrogate 

 Nature. Suppose we take a hen as she comes up to the house at 

 the close of a long day in summer from foraging in the fields, kill 

 her, take out her crop and analyze its contents. If we do so it is 

 obvious that we shall obtain at least a part of the information we 

 are after, for a hen lays in summer or not at all. 



What do we find as the result of our analysis ? The crop we 

 are dissecting has about as many articles in it as the average small 

 boy's pocket, and they are equally miscellaneous. We find grains 

 of corn that the hen has picked up about the barn, pieces of bread 

 and table waste that she has found under the sink spout, clover 

 leaves and tips of grass blades, bugs, worms and a mass of matter 

 that we cannot resolve into the original elements. The first thing 

 that impresses us as the result of our analysis is that the hen seeks 

 VARIETY. The second is, that this variety admits of classifica- 

 tion. This mass of miscellaneous matter that we found .in the 

 hen's crop can be arranged in three divisions: i. Grain. 2. 

 Green food and vegetables. 3. Animal food in the form of 

 bugs, worms and so forth. The conclusion is irresistible, that 

 these three elements must be combined if we would have a perfect 

 ration. 



How shall we combine them? The answer is not so difficult 

 as one would at first suppose. There are many ways. The hen 

 makes a new combination every day. Perhaps the ideal way is 

 to have no stereotyped method, but to study variety. If we com- 

 bine grain, green food and meat in the daily ration, the hen can 

 hardly fail to respond with a goodly output of eggs. 



