56 COMMERCIAL EGG FARMING 



eggs. The brooder house imist be ready by 

 April 1st. This will allow time for learning 

 how to fire and to dry the house before the 

 chicks are put in. 



Assuming that the farm is to have a 

 capacity of 1000 laying hens, it will be neces- 

 sary to raise 500 pullets to the laying age 

 during the first year. To make certain of 

 this it is necessary to incubate 2500 eggs. 

 Two thousand eggs may do, but it is safer 

 to allow a margin, as the period of the year 

 during which eggs can be hatched to pro- 

 duce pullets which -will lay at the right time 

 is limited from March 15th to April 21st. If 

 from any reason bad luck should attend your 

 efforts, say, about June, and chicks are lost, 

 then the margin I have mentioned will carry 

 you over. If bad luck does not come it is 

 easy to dispose of surplus well-bred pullets. 

 Usually too few are bred, rarely too many. 



The margin may to many seem large, but 

 on big American farms 8000 eggs are fre- 

 quently incubated to produce 1000 pullets at 

 the laying age. Allowing 10 per cent for in- 

 fertiles at first test from 2500 eggs leaves 

 2250. Allowing 10 per cent for dead germs 



