CHAPTER III 

 BROILER RAISING 



THIS intlnstry requires both skill and capital. A 

 successful broiler plant should be run in con- 

 nection with an egg farm, so that the eggs mav 

 be supplied from the home 3'ard. In winter time 

 purchased eggs often either get chilled or are infertile. 

 The second requisite to success is a good incubator. 

 Hens cannot do the hatching during cold weather. The 

 incubator must be so constructed that it will furnish a 

 uniform temperature throughout. The heat should 

 never fall below 101 degrees nor go al)ove 103. 



The brooder is important after the chickens have 

 been hatched. A brooder must be so constructed that 

 it is always a little warmer in the center than in other 

 portions. The temperature should be kept close up to 

 100 degrees for two or three days. After that ninety- 

 five degrees is about right for the remainder of the first 

 week, after which reduce the temperature five degrees 

 each week until seventy degrees is reached. 



An even temperature seems the key to raisim; 

 healthy winter chicks. A'isiting the Ehode Island 

 poultry school in 1901, the writer saw 600 in a rooiu 

 fifteen by twenty-eight feet heated by steam pipes and 

 radiators to a uniform temperature of about seventv- 

 two degrees day and night, excei^t for the first few dav< 

 of the chickens' life, when the temperature was eighty- 

 five to ninety. They were kept in small flocks in 

 brooder boxes and fed as usual. Although the chickens 

 never breathed outdoor air from hatching to the time 

 when at eight or ten weeks of age they were marketed 

 as broilers, they seemed very strong, active and thrifty, 

 and not over fifteen per cent were lost or proved defect- 



