WHITE HOLLAND TURKEYS. 



Beautiful In Shape and Chaste In Color, They Form an Excellent Foil for the Brilliant Hues of the Bronze Variety 

 While Their Many Excellent Qualities Make Them Worthy Rivals. 



By Mr. John R. Corbte. 



EARS ago we raised only the common turkeys 

 and we counted ourselves .among the lucky ones 

 if we, or rather I should say the old turkey 

 hens, raised sixteen or twenty a year. If the 

 young turkeys weighed when dressed in No- 

 vember eight or ten pounds they had done well. Along 

 about 1890 I developed a severe case of "poultry fever." I 

 have .been a reader of the Reliable Poultry Journal ever 

 since it came into existence. I have a complete 

 file of it down to date, which fact is explained when 

 I say that I consider it the leader among poultry papers. 



I also read other poultry and farm papers, and soon 

 I was convinced that better poultry and turkeys ought to be 

 raised on farms and that turkeys could be managed so that 

 there should be good profit in 

 them. Hunters were killing our 

 common turkeys for wild ones 

 because they wandered so far 

 from home, thereby causing us 

 considerable vexation and loss. 



We never had seen a pure 

 white turkey, but we read 

 about their gentleness and that 

 they did not roam like the 

 other varieties. So we soid all 

 our common ones and pur- 

 chased a trio of White Holland 

 turkeys from an R. P. J. ad- 

 vertiser, paying $7.50 for them 

 and $2 expressage — which seemed a big price then. Since 

 then we have paid more than that for a single bird. These 

 first birds were rather small, though pretty. Up to this time 

 I never had seen a standard, but I soon bought one and 

 learned that my birds were under weight, and feed them 

 how I would, I could not get that trio up to standard 

 weight. 



I soon learned where I could get large White Holland 

 turkeys, and I bought some more, still keeping the little, 

 plump hens. The next season the young poults were larger 

 than their mothers — the result of using a large torn. The 

 results have been about the same whether I used a large 

 young torn or an older bird, provided the young males were 

 big boned, biocky fellows mated to good blocky hens or pul- 

 lets. Still, I prefer a torn from two to five years old. I 

 wish to state here that when I began breeding this variety 

 of turkeys the toms at their best weighed only sixteen 

 pounds and the pullets and hens eight to ten pounds, but 

 during the past three or four years, by following my own 

 rules of mating as given here, my turkeys have doubled 

 these weights, so that now my young toms and pullets weigh 

 from fifteen to twenty-four pounds. 



I use both pullets and hens as breeders, though I am 

 careful to select the foest shaped ones— those that are blocky 

 an/I in first class health. The first eggs that are laid are 



A Flock ot White Hollamds, the Property of 

 Mr. John R. Garbee. 



given to domestic hens (eight or ten to each hen) or are 

 put in an incubator. We get successful hatches either way, 

 but we never have had success when we put the poults in 

 a brooder. It may be the fault of this particular make of 

 brooder, as I never have thought well of it, though it is 

 a high priced one. So we give the poults to hens. Now, 

 it is easy enough to hatch the poults, the main trouble is 

 to raise them. I am free to confess I do not know it all, 

 but some things I have learned from experience. I know I 

 have lost mere poults from lice, overfeeding and chilling 

 than from all other causes combined. Lice are the poults' 

 worst enemies, and next they surfer from overfeeding. Our 

 rule for feeding chicks is "any sound, wholesome food, fed 

 a little at a time." This rule applied to poults works equal- 

 ly well. We are most success- 

 ful when the weather is fair 

 and the food is given to them 

 three times a day, and not 

 faster than it could be digest- 

 ed. We find cottage cheese is 

 good for them and they like it, 

 but judgment must be used in 

 feeding it. I repeat that any 

 clean, wholesome food fed in 

 moderation is good for them. 

 We find a varied diet — corn 

 bread, cracked corn, wheat, 

 chopped vegetables, table 

 scraps, even corn dough occa- 

 sionally — works all right, while some breeders claim success 

 on one straight diet. 



After the second and third clutches of eggs are laid 

 we set the turkey hens. We always prefer to move them 

 to a suitable coop or barrel nest in the yard or near a poul- 

 try house, so they can be protected and cared for better. 

 They can be moved with but little trouble when broody. 

 They are confined to the nest for a few days by a slat coop, 

 after that they get off and on at will, food and fresh water 

 being kept near them. Remember always that lice are the 

 great drawback to successful turkey raising, and try to 

 have your sitting hen absolutely free from lice, mites or 

 jiggers when the eggs hatch, and then keep her free. Watch 

 the poults, too, and do not let them suffer from lice. A 

 clean coop and purs water are essential to success. 



Do not overfeed nor underfeed either. Provide a com- 

 fortable place for the hen and poults, so that the latter 

 may not get unduly chilled, and give the hen all the food 

 she will eat, so she will not be restless, but put her food 

 out of reach of the poults. Note how the latter will grow 

 with this. care. By the time they are feathered and large 

 enough to roam they will be but little care and they will 

 get a large share of their food from the fields, but if you 

 follow the method I have outlined they will always come 

 home for supper and will be very gentle. 



