COMMERCIAL EGG FARMING 5 



of poultry farming. Until 1904 I was 

 engaged in general farming in Vancouver 

 Island, B. C. The income derived from that 

 industry was earned with difficulty and the 

 prospects were not encouraging. I experi- 

 mented with various crops and kept careful 

 accounts. The work done was out of all pro- 

 portion to the earnings. In 1904 I met a 

 man who said he knew something of poultry 

 farming. We made an agreement that he 

 was to furnish the experience and I was to 

 furnish the land and capital. At the end of 

 a year, when he left, my accounts showed a 

 very good return on the capital, though these 

 early beginnings were on the old-fashioned 

 ideas of ten birds in a flock and hot wet 

 mashes. By 1906 I saw that unless I could 

 reduce the labor and hatch on a larger scale, 

 so that a safe income could be assured from 

 egg production alone, my position would not 

 be a much better one than that from which 1 

 was endeavoring to escape. 



In 1907 I had an opportunity to sell my 

 general farm and risk the money in starting 

 an egg farm. The customary opinion was 

 freely expressed by my neighbors to the 



