POULTRY BREEDING. 24I 



Professor Rice suffers from one defect, however, when it is 

 used to hold eggs which are to be incubated. The defect con- 

 sists in the fact that the eggs which are put on this table must 

 be turned individually by hand from day to day. It is generally 

 held that eggs awaiting incubation should be turned at least 

 once every 24 hours. To turn a large number of eggs individ- 

 ually by hand involves a large amount of labor. It was form- 

 erly the practice of this Station to store the eggs awaiting incu- 

 bation in an ordinary egg shipping crate- and then to turn this 

 crate from side to side or end to end each day. In that way 

 all the eggs in" the case would be turned daily without the con- 

 siderable labor involving in handling each one of them sepa- 

 rately. A mechanical turning device of this sort is put on the 

 market by several poultry supply firms. It is practically impos- 

 sible, however, to keep the eggs properly sorted as to mothers 

 in such a crate. The desideratum is an egg. distributing table 

 on which the eggs can be mechanically turned all together. 



Arriving at the actual incubation there presents itself in all 

 pedigree poultry breeding work the matter of keeping the eggs 

 originating from a given mother and the chicks which hatch 

 from them together in the incubator so that the pedigree of the 

 chicks at the time of hatching may be accurately recorded. 

 This means that some sort of a device must be perfected for 

 holding individual eggs and chicks of the same ancestry together 

 in the incubator, and separate from all others. 



After the chicks are hatched it is necessary to give each indi- 

 vidual a distinguishing mark which will be a reference to the 

 records wherein will be told its parentage. This necessitates 

 methods of expeditiously and accurately handling chick leg 

 bands. 



Finally it is necessary to have a system of book keeping for 

 keeping the pedigree records proper, which shall be accurate, 

 easy of reference, and simple enough to be operated rapidly so 

 that it can withstand the stress involved in the recording of 500 

 or 600 chickens all hatching at the same time. 



The methods and appliances which have been devised in 

 connection with the breeding work at the Maine Station bear 

 upon each of the matters enumerated at one point or another. 

 The remainder of the bulletin is devoted to detailed descriptions 

 of these methods and devices. 



