SUCCESSFUL CHICK GROWING 



all right enough. The fault is with you. You are feeding too 

 fat-producing food. In factory language, you are feeding the 

 furnace and neglecting to furnish material for the looms — in 

 this case the necessary elements for an egg product. You are 

 not feeding protein enough — meat, barley, oats and clover — 

 if the birds are confined so that they cannot glean from the fields 

 the insects, worms and vegetables they need to manufacture 

 meat and plumage and eggs. A healthy plumage is as essen- 

 tial for perfect chicks as any part of the body. When those 

 overfat hens have had a chance at green cut clover, meat, oats, 

 ■wheat, sea gravel, shells and charcoal at their discretion and are 

 made to exercise in open scratching sheds, then the eggs will 

 come smooth and firm in shell and hatch you the strong, healthy 

 chickens you desire. 



WHAT AND WHEN TO FEED 



Wheat is probably the most perfect food found in a single 

 grain. As it is desirabl to feed the meat in the mashes, the bi- 

 product of wheat from our best flour mills is probably better 

 and cheaper than whole wheat. 



Damaged wheat or grain is poor stuff to buy; good sound 

 •- heat screenings are far better. Only heavy, first-class oats 

 are profitable. None other should be bought. They are per- 

 fect bone food, but no single grain can be fed constantly and 

 satisfactory results be secured. 



The old saying that a barrel of oats and barrel of buckwheat 

 will make a barrel of eggs has, I fear, given a fictitious value 

 to buckwheat as a food for fowls. 



As the original saying came from a farmer whose flock had 

 a pan of clabbered milk to which to repair at will, and the run 

 of a bam stored with clover and millet, I am of the opinion 

 that the buckwheat ran away with the reputation that should 

 have been given to the milk and clover as the balancers of the 

 ration that gave the barrel of eggs. The fowls surely had no 

 ■excuse not to lay. 



Few will advise the buying of buckwheat when the mid- 

 dlings and bran from good sound wheat can be procured. Corn 

 and clover are all we can feed in winter to secure an egg whose 

 yolk will produce for us a golden sponge cake and custard. And 

 many famihes for this reason will pay 50 cents per dozen for 

 Brahma eggs the year round when the fowls are thus fed. Oats, 

 buckwheat and wheat, without clover, produce eggs that make 

 this cake and custard white. It is even well to know the cause 

 and effect of color in eggs. 



The vegetables to be fed are cabbage, green clover (steamed 

 when dry), mangels and lettuce. Those that are to be cooked 

 for mashes are potatoes, beets, onions, turnips, squashes or 

 pumpkins, steamed clover meal, beef scraps and corn meal — a 

 good combination for high colored eggs in winter. 



Corn meal and wheat should be mixed with boiled potatoes 

 and turnips. These many mashes should only be fed in suffi- 

 ■cient quantities so that they will be eaten up clean in the morn- 

 ing. If overdosed the flocks become cloyed and lazy. Give the 

 mash as a light breakfast and it will send the fowls to nest where 

 its stimulating influence hastens egg delivery. The last meal 

 at night should be of mixed grains, and pure water must be given 

 morning and evening, for to drink is the last thing a fowl does 

 before going to roost. There is no saving in feeding what is 

 called cob meal as the cob will not digest. Shell your com 

 before grinding. 



When a breeder is constantly with his flocks, it is probably 

 best to feed at four times during the day the quantity which one 

 Tiaturally would feed morning and evening. Fowls soon learn 

 to come at your call to feed them. I had one feeder whose call 

 was a regular war whoop, another used a dinner bell, another 

 a small school bell; but each brought all of the flock within 

 hearing. Fowls have brains and know how to use them. 



I have no use for a small head, diminutive comb, ear lobes 

 or wattles. These head embeEishments when generously 

 developed are sure signs of procreative vigor in a male. 



FORMULA No. i 



To return to feeding, I present in Formula No. 1 a meal 

 made up of 50 pounds of oats; 1 bushel of corn; 1 bushel of 

 barley; 2 bushels of wheat bran; 1 bushel of charcoal. 



These are to be well mixed and ground into a fine meal. 

 For a light breakfast use as much of this as necessary, add 20 

 per cent as much ground beef scraps and scald thoroughly, 

 leaving it stand over night. 



If too moist in the morning add wheat bran to secure a 

 crumbly mass. If in winter, or if the fowls be yarded away 

 from green food, add cloveri meal to the mixture. Feed dry 

 mixed grains at night. 



FORMULA No. z 



When feeding potatoes or turnips mash them and add equal 

 parts of corn meal, wheat bran and beef scraps until it is a crumb- 

 ly mass, letting the scraps or desiccated fish, whichever you use, 

 be 15 per cent of the bulk. Avoid all wet, sOggy mashes. Feed 

 dry grains in the scratching shed for balance of the day. If 

 you have cabbage or mangels, make the morning mash without 

 vegetables and give these raw vegetables for the flock to employ 

 themselves with through the day, concluding the day's feeding 

 with oats and barley. 



FORMULA No. 3 



In the morning mix hot steamed clover meal 20 per cent, 

 meat scrap or desiccated fish, 20 per cent, composite meal (as 

 in No. 1), 60 per cent, with sufficient skimmed milk or milk 

 whey to make a crumbly mass. Feed mixed grains balance of 

 the day in the litter of their shed. 



FORMULA No. 4 



You may live near a creamery, or run a butter farm, so that 

 you can secure or have quantities of skimmed milk and butter- 

 milk. Heat it to curds, using the whey to mix formula 3. 



For the second day give a light breakfast of mixed grains. 

 Then at noon take equal parts of beef scraps and cheese curds 

 well mixed, using enough wheat middlings and corn meal to ab- 

 sorb the moisture. For vegetables use cabbage and mangel 

 wurzels and feed oats and wheat at night. 



FORMULA No. 5 



Cow peas, oats and wheat bran, equal parts, are to be made 

 into a meal. Mix equal parts of this compound vrath clover 

 meal and meat meal. Scald into a hot mash for the morning 

 feed. 



Changing these mashes from day to day wiU supply every 

 possible want for egg production. When beans can be purchased 

 at one dollar per bushel, they are a, cheap ingredient to mix 

 with these mashes instead of barley. If you were to feed any 

 one of these formulas every day and all day, good as they are, 

 your fowls will reject them. Then change is the best policy. 



There is a false idea that salt is injurious to fowls. On the 

 other hand, these mashes should be reasonably seasoned with 

 pepper and salt to make them palatable to yourself. Don't 

 overdose them. 



In all formulas we take it for granted none but first-class 

 heavy oats or hulled oats are to be used. 



It is folly to buy damaged or musty grain for fowls. I 

 would not take such as a gift. With reference to oats for young 

 chicks, I would use only hulled or cmshed oats. 



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