2 BULLETIN 657, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



found that soft moated livo chickens in transit lose flesh rapidly and 

 that wet picking, scalding, or chilling birds in water, the methods 

 usual in farm preparation, waste substance and lessen the flavor and 

 the keeping quality of the birds. For these reasons it is rarely pro- 

 fitable for a farmer to coop fatten, or finish chickens at home and 

 ship them alive or as farm dressed poultry for distant markets. As 

 a result, more and more young chickens are being collected at central 

 feeding stations (fig. 1, PI. I), there to be fleshed quickly for market, 

 and slaughtered, dressed, chilled, and shipped without intervening 

 loss of flesh or flavor. The fleshing stations vary in size from those 

 with a capacity of 30,000 to those holding 1,000 head, depending upon 

 the size of the packing house attached. It is believed that final coop 

 finishing for market under certain conditions will offer returns as 

 a centralized cooperative activity for a group of farmers producing 

 an important aggregate of chickens each season. 



COMPOSITION OF RATIONS USED. 



It is possible to produce high quality flesh for food purposes very 

 rapidly and at comparatively small expense by feeding chickens a 

 suitable ration under appropriate conditions. Various rations based 

 upon grain mixtures wet with water or buttermilk have been used 

 by commercial feeders. The grains most commonly used are mix- 

 tures of corn and wheat. To these are added oats and occasionally 

 barley. One of the rations to be discussed in this bulletin includes 

 distillers' grains, which have not been used to any extent in chicken 

 flOshing. Rations composed of corn meal and buttermilk, and of 

 com meal and water have been fed simultaneously with the corn 

 meal, distillers' grains, and buttermilk. The comparative efficiency 

 of the three rations is given in the following pages. 



Composition of Rations. 



Ration A: Pounds. 



Xo. 3 whole corn, ground to a fine meal 100 



Water 127 



Ration B: 



No. 3 whole corn, ground to a fine meal 100 



' Fresh buttermilk 150 



] Li i ion C: 



No. 3 whole corn, ground to a fine meal 75 



Dried distillers' grains (corn) 25 



Fresh buttermilk 150 



When dried buttermilk is used 10 pounds of the J30wder should be 

 added to 90 pounds of water. Ration C is thicker in consistency 

 than the ration commonly fed. It should not be thinned, as is the 

 tendency among feeders using it for the first time. 



A chemical analysis of these feedstuffs and of the compomided 

 rations showed the compositions indicated in Table 1. These 

 results are the mean analyses of six lots of corn meal and two lots 



