MAINE AGRICULTURAI, EXPERIMENT STATION. 3 1 



lioiise, one in each of the back corners of the building. In this 

 way one end wall and the back wall of the building form two of 

 the sides of each brooder. The remaining side and cover are 

 made of cloth tacked on light wooden frames as shown in the 

 working drawings. 



The floor of the brooder stands lo inches above the floor of 

 the house. From the front of the brooder a sloping walk ex- 

 tends down to the house floor, reaching in width clear across 

 the whole front of the brooder. The cloth front and side of 

 the brooder are not permanently fixed in position but are 

 removable panels, which are held together and to the frame 

 work by hooks and eyes (see fig 4). The cover is hinged 

 in the middle in such a way that it can be either half opened 

 or entirely opened and folded back out of the way. In con- 

 sequence of this arrangement it iS possible to regulate with 

 great nicety the amount of air which shall be admitted to the 

 brooder. Either the front or the side panel may be tilted out as 

 much as desired at the base thus admitting air there. Further- 

 more by partly opening a panel and the cover it is possible to 

 insure that there shall be a circulation of air through the 

 brooder at all times. 



The hover used in this brooder is the Universal Hover, made 

 by the Prairie State Incubator Co., Homer City. Pa. It is, how- 

 ever, modified in certain particulars for present use. In the 

 first place the arrangement is such that the lamp is inside the 

 house underneath the brooder rather than in a box outside the 

 house, as in the usual arrangement of this hover. The lamp 

 in this brooder is in the house directly under the hover. The 

 reason for this modification is that in this climate, where one 

 is likely to have bad weather during the early part of the hatch- 

 ing and rearing season, wi'th heavy winds, snow, and rain, it is 

 much easier and more satisfactory to take care of the lamp 

 inside the house than from a small box outside the house. An- 

 other modification is that in the hovers which are installed in 

 these broor'ers an especially heavy insulation is put on top of 

 the. (!rum to reduce the loss of heat by radiation in extremely 

 ■cold weather early in the spring. 



One of the essential points about the brooder is its compact- 

 ness in storage, and the fact that all the parts may be stored 

 in the base of the brooder itself. In this way the labor expense 



