POULTRY-CRAFT. * 23 
CHAPTER III. 
Poultry Houses and Yards. 
27. General Remarks.— It is important that fowls be properly housed. 
This can be accomplished without using elaborate or expensive buildings. A 
poultry house should be free from drafts, so constructed that the inner 
temperature will vary slowly with fluctuations in the weather. The windows 
should be so placed that the sun will shine into the house for a few hours 
daily,—in winter, the longer the better. These things, and a suitable 
situation, are essential. The permanent lack of any one of them invariably 
affects the health of the fowls, sooner or later bringing «lisease and loss. ,A 
house furnishing the conditions essential to the welfare of its tenants may be 
unsightly to the eye, inconvenient for the attendant, yet cannot be regarded as 
unsuitable for fowls. A person is sometimes so situated that if he would have 
_ a few fowls he must make shift to keep them in quarters not specially suited to 
poultry keeping. If the essential conditions specified can be secured, the 
fowls can do very well. Ifthe conditions named cannot be secured, it is better 
not to try to keep poultry. The inconveniences incident to caring for fowls in 
makeshift and poorly planned houses are matters of small moment to the 
amateur who gives his fowls but little of his time. To one who keeps fowls 
on an increasing scale such inconveniences soon become costly annoyances, 
and the buildings, often, must be completely remodeled. It is therefore 
always best for a poultryman to consider carefully before beginning to build 
or to make alterations; and a beginner, particularly, should make himself so 
familiar with the principles of poultry house construction, the different styles 
of houses, the methods of platting poultry plants, that whatever the scale of his 
future operations, each building erected may be built to stand many years 
without alteration and without other repairs than those made necessary by the 
ordinary wear and tear of weather and daily use. Nearly all the designs given 
in this chapter are modeled after, or adapted from, plans used and approved 
by practical poultrymen. (The exceptions merit attention, embodying as they 
do some ideas approved by the experience of poultry keepers, though not yet 
tested). The buildings described have been selected as furnishing typical 
examples of different styles of poultry houses. As a comparison of the plans 
will show, many of the details may be applied in any or all the various styles 
of houses. The greatest possible variety has been introduced in the minor 
details of the drawings, to avoid an unnecessary multiplication of illustrations. 
Having selected the style of house which suits him best, anyone intelligent 
enough to build a poultry house can adapt to it such minor features of other 
