THE CALL OF THE HEN. 55 



fingers abdomen, three ringers out of condition and 1-16 pelvic 

 bones. Her head and actions indicated perfect health. I told 

 him she might lay 180 eggs her first laying year if her condi- 

 tion had been the same as it was at the present time but if 

 she was my hen I thought I might be able to make her Iny 

 280 eggs. You don't feed her half enough. He replied: "That 

 is the only hen I have that lays a white egg. I got her when a 

 pullet before she commenced to lay. She has been laying 1 about 

 a year and has laid 176 eggs. I Wad a small lot of hens at the 

 time that were so fat they were dying and I cut down their 

 feed and have fed them sparingly ever since so they 

 would not get too fat and die. I went to his place and found 

 he had three types of hens, the typical meat type (one with 

 pelvic bones one inch and one-eighth thick), some with pelvic 

 bones a half inch thick, and this hen that layed the white eggs 

 w*hose pelvic bones were 1-16 of an inch thick. I told him to 

 segregate his hens into three lots, and feed them according to 

 their type. Give the egg type all the grain they could clean 

 up each day in scratching shed with a dry balanced rrtash be- 

 fore them all the time.. The dual purpose type hens should 

 be fed all the grain they wished to scratch for, with an occas- 

 ional mash and the beef type hens should be fed what grain 

 they could clean up in the scratching shed in about an hour. 

 The litter should be good and deep in all cases. I did not 

 mention charcoal, grit, shells and green stuff as that is not my 

 business. Every man who takes a poultry paper knows that 

 part of the business and every person who keeps poultry 

 should take a poultry paper in order to keep 'posted on cur- 

 rent poultry topics. 



The gentlenuan wrote me over a year later that he had 

 succeeded in bringing the hen up to normal condition as in 

 Fig. 19, but after laying a while she went back to five fingers 

 abdomen and one finger out of condition and had layed 238 

 eggs her next laying year. 



We will now take another hen. She may be four fingers 

 abdomen as in Fig. 15, in good condition as in Fig. 19 and her 

 pelvic bones may be (1-16) one sixteenth of an inch thick as 

 in Fig. 24. She would read four fingers abdomen, good condi- 

 tion 1-16 pelvic bone. If we consult No. 4 chart we will find 

 she is a 220 egg type hen. The next hen may be also four 

 fingers abdomen as in Fig. 15, in good condition as in Fig. 19, 



