14 EGG MONEY 



incubators and brooders. If a less number are handled 

 we doubt if their use is to be advised in a majority of cases. 

 It may be urged that by the use of incubators and brooders, 

 chicks may be hatched and reared early in the season when 

 sitting hens cannot be obtained. But we must remember 

 that in order to secure eggs when the price is high, in the 

 early fall and winter, we must have early hatched fowls. 

 These in turn will show a desire to incubate in the early 

 spring — early enough to have the chicks hatched at the 

 proper time. This, of course, does not apply in cases where 

 the breed used is of the non-sitting class. 



Brood coops are needed where hens do the rearing, and 

 roosting coops are required whatever the method of hatch- 

 ing and caring for the little chicks. In addition to the 

 houses, coops, incubators and brooders, very little in the 

 way of equipment and utensils is necessary. Cookers for 

 heating water and cooking food, troughs and shovels for 

 mixing mashes, and pails for carrying the food to the houses 

 complete the equipment, aside from that in the houses 

 themselves which includes feeding troughs, dry food hoppers, 

 grit and shell boxes, nests and water fountains. Shovels 

 and hoes are required for caring for and cleaning the houses 

 and a chest of tools is needed for making lepairs, building 

 coops and utensils. 



The Comparative Cost. 



With lumber and other building materials selling at the 

 present high prices, with no prospect of lower prices in the 

 future, it is, of course, impossible to construct a plant for 

 egg production without considerable outlay; but from the 

 cost of erecting bams and stables for horses and cows and 

 the cost of erecting brooding houses, incubator cellars, etc., 

 for broiler plants, it is evident that the cost of making a 

 practical poultry plant where the production of eggs is to 

 be the main feature is not by any means high. There is 

 no one thing required for the business that is costly to pur- 

 chase or construct and the chief expense of producing eggs 

 is in the labor of caring for the fowls and the feed required. 



