114 MAIXE AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENT STATION. I905. 



scratch for. At i o'clock the hard grains are again fed as in 

 the morning and at 4.30 to 5 o'clock they are fed on the rolled 

 oats and egg mixture, giving- all they -will eat until dark. 



When they are about three weeks old the rolled oats and egg 

 mixture is gradually displaced by a mixture made up of two 

 parts by weight of good clean bran, 2 parts corn meal, i part 

 middlings or Red Dog flour, i part linseed meal and i part fine 

 beef scrap. This mixture is moistened just enough with water 

 so that it is not sticky but will crumble when a handful is 

 squeezed and then released. The birds are developed far enough 

 by this time so that the tin plates are discarded for light flat 

 troughs with low sides. 



The hard broken grains may be safely used all the wa} along 

 and the fine meals left out, but the chicks do not grow so fast as 

 when the mash is fed. There seems to be least danger from 

 bowel looseness when the dry grains only are fed and it is ven.' 

 essential that the mash be dry enough to crumble in order to 

 avoid that difficulty. Young chicks like the moist mash better 

 than though it was not moistened and will eat more of it. There 

 is no danger from the free use of the properly made mash, twice 

 a day, and being already ground the young birds can eat and 

 .digest more of it than when the food is all coarse. This is a very 

 important fact and should be taken advantage of at the time 

 when the young things are most susceptible to rapid gro%\th. 

 But the development must be moderate during the first few 

 weeks. The digestive organs must be kept in normal condition 

 by the partial use of hard foods and the gizzard must not be 

 deprived of its legitimate work and allowed to become weak by 

 disuse. 



By the middle of June the chickens that were hatched in April 

 are being fed on cracked corn, wheat and the mash. At about 

 that time the portable houses with their contents of chickens are 

 drawn from their winter locations out to an open hayfield where 

 the crop has been har\-e5ted and the grass is short and green. 



Until last season we had continued feeding two feeds of 

 cracked corn and wheat and two of mash daily as long as the 

 birds remained in the field. Last June we had 1,400 chickens 

 well started and we changed the plan of feeding by keeping 

 cracked com, wheat, and beef scrap, in separate slatted troughs 



