ARTIFICIAL INCUBATING AND BROODING 



other great advantage is that the foods are not too concentrated. 

 If we study the natural way of chicks feeding, which is here a 

 seed, there a grain, then a bug or worm, and that very much 

 exercise in the way of running about, scratching and searching 

 accompanies the feeding, we can readily understand that 

 exercise or working for the food is a substantial aid to the pro- 

 cess of digestion; hence we cannot too strongly urge that it is 

 most reasonable, and will be most certainly profitable, for us to 

 study and closely follow the natural way. 



TWO GOOD JOHNNY CAKES 



Probably the next method is feeding for the first week or 

 ten days a. well baked johnnycake; and the term well-baked 

 ought to be made particularly emphatic, because it means a 

 great deal. A johnnycake should be baked several hours, four 

 to six hours, in a slow oven. Then it is an easily crumbled cake 

 and should have no stickiness or doughiness about it. Two 

 formulas which have been made by Dr. P. T. Woods, and have 

 given good results in the Jiands of practical chicken men, are 

 the following: 



JOHNNY CAKE NO. 1 



Two quarts of bran (or shorts.) 

 Two quarts of coarse com meal. 

 One quart of wheat middlings. 

 One handful of good clean beef scraps. 

 One handful of good chicken grit. 



Rub these together dry with from two to four infertile eggs, 

 and mix all together with barely enough skim milk to just moist- 



50— EASILY CONSTRUCTED FATTENING CRATE 



en it. Rub the whole into a moist, crumbly mass with the hands, 

 then put in a well greased pan (a roasting pan about three inches 

 deep is the best) and press down hard to stick cake together. 



JOHNNY CAKE NO. 2 



Two and a half quarts of bran (or shorts.) 



Two and a half quarts of com meal. 



Two quarts of ground oats, sifted. 



One quart of clover meal. 



One handful of coarse bone meal. 



One handful of beef scraps. 



Mix all together while dry and then rub in half a dozen 

 infertile eggs. Wet up with milk or water (or both) and add one 

 heaping teaspoonful of baking soda and one teacupful of pure 

 cider vinegar, mix the whole thoroughly into a stiff dough and 

 bake three to six hours in a slow oven. It is claimed for this 

 johnnycake No. 2 that, where chicks are not very strong and 

 have a tendency to bowel trouble, it will prevent their pasting 

 up behind. 



A popular food for the first week with some chicken raisers 

 is either cracker crumbs or dried bread crumbs thoroughly mix- 

 ed with finely chopped, hard-boiled eggs, and a very little or no 

 moisture added; but hard-boiled eggs are a very concentrated food 

 and there should be at least four or five times as much cracker 

 crumbs or bread crumbs as there is of egg. Pinhead oatmeal or 

 rolled oats makes a superior chick food, and where pinhead oat- 

 meal can be bought by the barrel (or bulk) at a cost not exceed- 

 ing two and a half or three cents per pound, it is an excellent 

 food. The little chicks should be fed four or five times a day, 

 say every two or two and a half hours, for the first week or ten 

 days; and all dry-grain mixtures should be thrown in the scratch- 

 ing litter to promote exercise; and if the soft feeding method is 

 employed, some dry grains should be scattered in the litter to 

 give variety and induce exercise. If chicks are fed a soft food 

 all the food not eaten within a few minutes should be removed, 

 so that it will not become sour from the heat. 



FEED A VARIETY 



After the first few feedings chickens need a variety of foods 

 The dry-grain chick foods supply this. Where other method, 

 are employed they should have, in addition to their johnnycake 

 and mash foods, feedings of cut or rolled oats, cut wheat and 

 granulated com (this is fine cracked com with the coarse cracked 

 and fine meal sifted out, and is known in some localities as 

 "com grits".) Where a dry grain chick food is used a little 

 pure beef scrap, which has been steamed or barely moistened 

 by scalding water, should be fed each day after the chicks are 

 a week old. The chicks should, after they are 

 four or five days old, have one or two feedings 

 a day of some bright, fresh, green food, like 

 lettuce, cabbage or the fresh, green shoots of 

 sprouted grain. Where it is possible to give 

 the little chicks a clean grass-r\m, it will be 

 beneficial. 



After the first week, four times a day is 

 often enough to feed. It is a mistake to feed 

 too much or too often. The chicks need a 

 little time between meals to work and get up 

 an appetite. They must be kept hungry, but 

 not too hungry, and with most people there is 

 more danger of overfeeding than of starving 

 them. If the chickens appear dumpish and 

 do not take hold of their food eagerly, try 

 lighter feedings and add more grit to their 

 food. Feeding grit in such cases will often 

 work wonders. 



Until the chicks are ten days or two weeks 

 old they will be fed practically the same, 

 whether they are intended for market or for 

 use as stock birds. If they are started right the battle is half 

 won. After the second week the manner of feeding and caring 

 for them depends on whether they are intended for broilers or 

 roasters, or whether they are to become layers or breeders. 

 If all are treated alike and the careless grower makes his 

 selection of laying and breeding stock out of his "pushed- 

 for-market" flock it will eventually prove a detriment to his 

 poultry, and will in a short time find himself confronted with 

 some of the many poultry troubles which result from failure to 

 use good judgment. 



KEEP THE RIGHT HEAT 



Too much or too little heat in the brooder is the cause of 

 not a little chick mortality; this also is very likely to manifest 

 itself in "bowel trouble." If the brooders are overheated the 

 little chicks get to perspiring, the pores of the skin are opened, 

 and an exposure to a chilling atmosphere causes congestion and 

 cold and a diarrhoea quickly develops. Sometimes too many 

 cooks spoil the broth, and more than one brooder full of chicks 



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