CHAPTER III 

 Location 



First of all we must have a suitable location. This 

 is a very important thing if you are going in the poultry 

 business as a business. If you do not own a farm, by all 

 means spend some time and get one suitable for the 

 business. I advise not less than fifty to seventy-five acres. 

 One with a nice, big orchard on it is most desirable. And 

 by all means get a place with one or more streams of 

 water running through it, and if these streams are fed by 

 springs so much the better. Under no circumstances 

 buy a place for the poultry business unless it is well 

 watered, for this is where the saving of labor comes in, 

 and the poultry will do much better — this is nature. 



Get a place sloping to the south, with gravelly or sandy 

 soil, if possible. Sixty acres will carry five thousand lay- 

 ers nicely and leave room enough to raise six thousand 

 youngsters if it is laid out right, besides pasturing your 

 horses, cows and various other things you will want on 

 a farm. An ideal poultry farm should be inclosed with 

 a five-foot fence of wire netting and two barb wires over 

 this. It should also have a base board of rough hem- 

 lock sunk two inches or more in the ground. This makes 

 a fence proof against all kinds of animals, and there is 

 nothing that has more enemies than chickens. This is all 

 the fence you will need on your plant, as a rule, unless 

 you go in the fancy line, or in dividing your cockerels 

 and pullets. In these cases you should fence in the fields. 

 Your hens must have free range if you want results. 

 And you must remember the profit lies in eggs. There- 

 fore, an egg plant is what you must have to make money, 

 and a plant of this kind laid out right and handled prop- 

 erly can be run by the labor of one man most of the 

 time, as under my system labor is a very small item — 

 and labor has put more poultry plants out of business 

 than any other one thing. 



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