26 BRIGGS' SYSTE:\I OF 



CHAPTER X. 



Processed oats and how to produce it. 



I will now tell you of one of the most wonderful 

 feeds known at the present time. Positively one of 

 the greatest egg producers ever discovered and some- 

 thing that will make eggs hatch any time of the year. 

 Oats is to a hen what oats is to a horse. What would 

 a horse be worth without oats? But very little! The 

 main objection to oats for fowls is their very tough 

 hull, which is very hard to digest, and for this reason 

 alone many people will not feed them to their hens. 

 I have experimented very extensively with oats and 

 have fed them for weeks boiled, with no results in 

 eggs. They make a very good fattening feed when 

 boiled, but of no value for eggs — simply put the hens 

 out of laying condition. But when processed, hens 

 eat them in preference to anything else. In fact, they 

 will eat them when they will touch nothing else, while 

 on the other hand, they are the last things eaten by 

 the hens in their natural dr}- state. I will now tell 

 }'ou how to process them. 



Take a pail of good quality clipped oats, cover 

 them with water and let them soak twenty-four hours. 

 Then turn them in a box that will hold fully five pails 

 full. I'lrst bore t^\■o half-inch holes in each end of 

 box in the bottom so it will not hold water. After 

 putting your oats in this box, cover them up with an 

 old blanket or old bags. In the A\-inter time, or when it 

 gets cold and freezing, these boxes of oats should be 

 put in a cellar — the warmer a place, the better — and 

 they should be thoroughly Avet every night and morn- 

 ing with a sprinkling pot of warm water. If you want 

 to use them quick, it will take from a week to ten days 

 to get them in prime condition for feeding, depending 

 on how warm a place you have them in, and whether 

 you use warm or cold water in sprinkling them with. 

 Now, as I said, sprinkle them with warm water in 

 winter time and stir them up every night and morn- 



