SUCCESSFUL POULTRY KEEPING 



MODEL BROODING HOUSE 



PLANNED TO ACCOMMODATE CHICKS NEWLY 

 HATCHED TO THOSE SIX WEEKS OLD— FORTY- 

 TWO PENS WITH "PROGRESSIVE" RUNS INTO 

 WHICH THE CHICKS ARE DAILY MOVED— INCUBA- 

 TOR ROOM AND IMPORTANCE OF VENTILATION 



C. H. PAYNE, C. E. 



We have visited a number of poultry plants, both in Europe 

 and America, and have been astonished to see the great dis- 

 advantages under which poultrymen are frequently struggling. 

 The trouble is, so many plants have grown up bit by bit, without 

 any definite object in view. Additions have been made to suit 

 the convenience of the moment, and as a whole they are far 

 from economic or satisfactory. In starting a poultry plant, no 

 matter whether you have an acre or a hundred acres, make or 

 have made for you, a plan of how you can best utilize the whole 

 of your land so as to enable you to run a big business with the 



bule and prevents a rush of cold air entering the room and so 

 lowering the temperature. 



One of the details that is frequently overlooked is the ven- 

 tilation of the incubator room. It is simply absurd to install 

 the room with machines, scientifically designed to supply the 

 embryo chicks with pure air when the room is imperfectly con- 

 structed, and does not itself contain pure air. In civil engineer- 

 ing we have had considerable experience in the ventilation of 

 pubhc buildings, and therefore speak understandingly. We 

 tell you plainly that it is not enough to have an inlet here and 

 an outlet there, and trust to natural ventilation. The poultry- 

 man who would put perfect vitality into his chicks can only do 

 so by the oxidation of the embryo by a constant supply of pure 



FIG. i-GROUND PLAN OF BROODER HOUSE WITH INCUBATOR ROOM AND "PRO- 

 GRESSIVE RUNS" FOR CHICKS UP TO SIX WEEKS OLD 



least possible labor. Then build as little or as much as you 

 wish, but stick to your plan, and you will ultimately have a com- 

 plete plant with every bmlding in the right place. 



As a guide to the beginner, or to the poultryman who finds 

 himself all wrong and decides to start over again, as many 

 successful poultrymen have had to do, we shall describe and 

 illustrate some parts of the plan that we are working upon in 

 building up the Utility Poultry Farm. There are of course 

 many differences of opinion in the handling of chickens, and there 

 are many methods. After thirty years' experience during which 

 we have studied and investigated the best methods on both 

 sides of the Atlantic, we have adopted these ideas, among 

 others, as giving the best results for the money invested. 



INCUBATOR ROOM AND ITS VENTILATION 



The incubator room is of the usual character, sunk into 

 the ground to a depth of three feet. This depth of excavation 

 is ample in the northern states for up-to-date machines. The 

 furnace room for the brooder house is also sunk three feet below 

 the corridor floor and the entrance to the incubator room, being 

 through this sunken part of the brooder house, acts as a vesti- 



air into the incubator room. This air should contain in its 

 bulk about twenty-one parts of oxygen to seventy-nine parts 

 of nitrogen; which is essentially common pure air. If we intro- 

 duce such air into the incubator, this oxygen of the air passes 

 freely through the porous sheUs of the eggs, and in the more 

 developed stages of the embryo, much of the oxygen is con- 

 sumed as fuel in supplying the animal heat, and the volume of 

 air that leaves the machine contains carbon dioxide in place of 

 the oxygen that went in. 



Then again, the lamps of the machines in the act of com- 

 bustion consume a quantity of oxygen, which undergoes a similar 

 chemical change, and so the atmosphere of the room becomes 

 charged with noxious gases, which, to say nothing of the peculiar 

 odor of the oil of the lamps, renders the air void of life-giving 

 power. We must therefore adopt some definite method of cir- 

 culating throughout the room, without drafts, a continuous 

 and sufiicient supply of fresh pure air. 



TO PREVENT STAGNANT AIR 



With a temperature of sixty degrees in the room and an 

 external temperature of forty degrees, two ordinary flues open- 



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