POULTR?-CRAFT. 129 
171. Fall Management of Laying Stock. — The established poultry- 
man’s year begins in the fall. The precise date is not a matter of consequence. 
Many like to place it at October rst. It is really governed in individual cases 
by circumstances. It is not always possible to have everything in readiness 
for winter as early in the fall as one would wish. Every effort should, how- 
ever, be made to have the laying stock in winter quarters —and not over- 
crowded — before the first cold rain storms or sharp cool nights come. The 
time for these varies with the latitude, and sometimes they are postponed 
until quite late ; but it is the best policy to be prepared for them. 
By early September pullets intended for early winter layers should be well 
grown, and beginning to show signs of approaching maturity. Unless there 
is room and to spare, all under-sized and poorly developed pullets should have 
been sold. [Late hatched pullets that will come to laying in mid-winter, it 
will pay to keep, if the stock of early birds is short, and there is abundance of 
room; otherwise, the sooner they are sold, after reaching a marketable age, 
the better. It never will pay to over-crowd stock that might lay early]. The 
hens reserved to keep through a second winter, should be about half through 
their moult ; all others should have been disposed of. * 
Both hens and pullets should be well fed. Whole corn may be used now 
at night quite as freely as in the coldest winter weather. It is a mistake to 
feed moulting hens short, and a mistake to feed them a too highly nitrogenous 
ration. Hens moult better on a carbonaceous ration, quite a fattening one, 
than on a narrower one, and will lay better afterwards. Moulting hens need 
nitrogenous matter for feathers; they also need additional heat producing food 
to keep them warm while growing new feathers. It is better that they should 
be fat than poor, and safer to keep them a trifle over-fat, rather than barely 
in good condition. Ifthe weather continues fine, most good layers (non-sitters 
sometimes excepted) will, if well fed with an ordinary fattening ration, lay 
every third or fourth day while moulting. The pullets can stand high feeding, 
because only the most advanced are full-feathered. Few. are full grown. In 
pared for outside work as follows: Slake in boiling water one-half bushel of lime. 
Strain so as to remove all sediment. Add two pounds of sulphate of zinc and one pound 
of common salt, and one-half pound of whiting thoroughly dissolved. Mix to a proper 
consistency with skimmed milk, and apply hot. If white is not desired add enough 
coloring matter to produce the desired shade.” 
* NoTE.— Right here comes up a point in management which is of particular interest 
to farmers and to others who keep fair sized single flocks of poultry. It is a common 
practice with such, when selling poultry, or killing it for the table, to select the best and 
most salable birds, considering only the question of their immediate use, and not regard- 
ing at all the effect of this practice on the flock. The result is that nearly always the 
flock that is to furnish winter eggs —if winter eggs are obtained —is made up of the 
‘‘rag, tag and bob-tail” of several seasons. To reverse this method of selection, and 
keep only the best for layers, would do as much as any other one thing to improve the 
general average of egg production. This is one of the ways in which those who have 
little time to give their fowls can secure an increase of profit without extra Jabor. 
