32 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 



mer is to cultivate this ground and keep sowing- oata> 

 and at night hitch up your horse and give each flock 

 of fowls about two quarts of cracked corn and gather 

 your. eggs. If you follow up this system the hens will 

 keep at it all during the molting season. You must 

 make your rounds every week during the summer and 

 fill all your hoppers, one with beef scraps, one with 

 wheat screenings. Also your grit, oyster shells and 

 charcoal. These must be before them winter and summer. 

 Never let them get empty, and when freezing weather 

 comes in the fall you must change your plans at once if 

 you want the egg yield to continue. Remember this is 

 where the profit comes in. Under no circumstances let 

 your hens fall off on eggs ; start on your winter ra- 

 tions, as I have outlined in a previous chapter, just as 

 soon as severe weather of November comes on. 



■During the summer your windows are to be left 

 open day and night ; also your door, providing your plant 

 is enclosed with a wire netting fence such as I described 

 in opening chapter of this book. 



You must remember one thing. If you let your 

 fowls get knocked out in any way, through careless- 

 ness, it will take three to four weeks to get them back 

 again. And you in the meantime have lost a month's 

 laying of eggs. So great care and judgment must be 

 used. Sickness will scarcely be known under these 

 conditions. Your hens should always be in the pink 

 of condition, and your eggs from January to Septem- 

 ber should run 90 per cent fertile and give wonderful 

 hatches. I think you will agree with me that this is 

 caring for fowls the nearest to nature's way of any 

 system known at the present time. 



