44 RAISING FOWLS AND EGGS 



also, for their benefit and convenience. Here they chirp and run 

 about their little yards, and grow and thrive continuously, until 

 they become good-sized broilers ; and then, at weights of from 

 one and a half to two and a half pounds each, they are fattened, 

 dressed, and sent to the hotels and restaurants in New York at 

 forty to fifty cents per pound, dead weight, to be served up as the 

 always-desirable early spring chickens we see announced upon the 

 fashionable hotel and restaurant bills of fare in that city. 



There is always a ready demand for these chicks. Mr. Baker 

 will hatch and raise over two hundred thousand during the 

 present year, probably ; and he offers nothing for sale, but always 

 finds his market for everything he can get into good condition, 

 as we have described. 



In this house the chickens are " brooded " when quite young 

 by a patent hen-mother to each pen, which is hollow, made of 

 zinc and filled with hot water, lined underneath with blanketing 

 (not sheep's wool), and fixed close to the ground in a slightly 

 inclined position, underneath which the chicks creep for extra 

 warmth, when they feel the need of it, and which answers the 

 full purposes of the " brooding " afforded by the natural mother- 

 hen, without the lice nuisance that so commonly accompanies 

 the natural mode of brooding. 



At the proper age, selected transfers are made from this house 

 to another and larger range of buildings, similarly glazed and 

 ventilated, in which are also confined, in numerous separate 

 apartments, the laying-hen^ and pullets kept on the premises by 

 Mr. Baker. This latter range is glazed on one side only, and 

 contains seventy-five separate pens. 



This laying-house (four hundred and sixty feet long) is divided 

 into seventy-five compartments, and each pen has three rooms or 

 divisions in it. The pens run through from front to rear, and 

 are six feet wide, each, by twenty feet long, from east to west, 

 upon the following ground plan, on page 51. 



The front of the middle sections- of these pens is. provided 

 each with sashes that raise to the roof or lower at will to open 

 or close up the two back parts of the pen in cold weather, the 

 front division being covered on top and outside with open mesh- 

 wire only, beneath which, in fine weather, the laying-fowls enjoy 

 the open air and the limited run. These pens have a clean, dry, 

 graveled floor all through, and the whole premises there are 

 thoroughly underdrained, to keep, them perfectly dry at all sea- 

 sons. Above the ground-floor the pens are well ventilated, and 



