POULTRY EXPERIMElNTS. 121 



foods, and the gizzard must not be deprived of its legitimate 

 work and allowed to become weak by disuse. 



By the time the chicks are 5 or 6 weeks old, the small broken 

 grains are discontinued and the 2 litter feeds are wholly of 

 screened cracked corn and whole wheat. Only good clean 

 wheat, that is not sour or musty, should be used. 



FINISHING THE BROILERS. 



When the chickens are about 9 or 10 weeks old, and the 

 cockerels weigh a pound and a quarter to a pound and a half, 

 the cockerels are put by themselves, into vacated brooder houses, 

 100 to a house. Each house has a yard in front, about 12 feet 

 square. They are fed on porridge, 3 times a day, in V-shaped 

 troughs, with 4-inch sides. The porridge is made of 6 parts 

 corn meal, 2 parts middlings, ^/^ part linseed meal and 2 parts 

 beef scrap. Not having milk, it is mixed with tepid water. 

 It is made thick enough so it will drop and not run, from the 

 end of a wooden spoon. They are given all they will eat in 

 half an hour, when the troughs are removed and cleaned. When 

 the yards get dirty, they are bedded down with sand, straw or 

 hay. The birds will stand this feeding for 2 or 3 weeks with 

 good appetites. When they commence taking less food they 

 are dressed for market and usually weigh about 234 pounds 

 dressed weight. 



FOOD AND OTHER MATERIAL REQUIRED TO GROW CHICKS TO 



BROILER SIZE. 



To make broiler raising most profitable, warmed houses 

 should be used and the birds raised early enough to be all 

 marketed while high prices are obtainable. 



The Station does not make a specialty of broiler raising. 

 The chickens are raised so as to obtain the pullets for egg 

 laying. The surplus cockerels are disposed of by growing 

 them rapidly and getting them off to market before they annoy 

 the pullets. As the cockerels and pullets are raised together, 

 and the cockerels only are finished and sold as broilers, it is 

 not possible to state just how much of the food given to the 

 flock has been eaten by the cockerels, as they were larger and 

 evidently ate more per bird than the pullets did. The quan- 

 tities of food eaten, aside from labor, have been accounted 



