RANKIN'S DUCK BOOK 



easy to excavate a place in a side hill, or on level ground. 

 Stone it up five feet high at the sides. It is not necessary to 

 dig more than two of three feet deep, as the excavated dirt 

 can be used to bank up with on the outside. Upon this stone- 

 work put a simple roof. I used a building of this description. 

 The original cost, exclusive of labor, was $15. It was large 

 enough for two machines.. My new incubator room was ten 

 times as large, but. 'the cost was in proportion. 



This building never froze in winter, and was always some 

 ten or fifteen degrees/colder than the outside temperature in 

 summer, making- a,. -very handy place to keep eggs for incu- 

 bating purposes. •; It is well to run your machine a few days 

 and get the control of: it: The next thing is to fill it with 

 fresh fertile eggs. In the winter time, if one. does not have 

 eggs himself, this is -sometimes a very difficult thing to do, 

 for the eggs must not. only be fresh, but fertile. The young 

 beginner is often .obliged to depend upon others for his eggs 

 when first starting in. the business, but the poulterer, as a rule, 

 cannot afford to .do this, because he can grow them a good 

 deal cheaper than he, can buy; and not only this, and what 

 is more to the pointy. he, by proper care and feed during the 

 winter months, can :make his own eggs a great deal more 

 fertile than any he can buy of others. Usually about one- 

 third of our novices go right to the stores and purchase eggs 

 to fill their machines, with. 



This is running' a great risk, especially during the summer 

 months, but will give the reader an idea of the amount of 

 knowledge that many ! of our would-be poultry men have ac- 

 quired to begin with, and when he knows that the incubator 

 has to shoulder all these mistakes, he will naturally have a 

 little sympathy for the maker. Several years ago I sold a 

 six hundred-egg machine to a lady, who, on receiving it, filled 

 it promptly with eggs obtained from the grocers. Now, as 

 this was in the month of December, it was, to say the least, 

 an exceedingly doubtful operation. As she only got about 

 forty chicks she was naturally very much dissatisfied, and 

 strongly denounced both the machine and the maker. Her 

 husband suggested that possibly the machine was not to 

 blame, and that the eggs might have something to do with it. 

 They went to the grocer to enquire about it. He told them 

 that he had had some of those eggs on hand for several weeks, 

 and that they had been exposed to the cold and freezing 

 weather, and that probably the farmers from whom he had 

 obtained them had held them for high prices. 



They found on enquiry that this was the case, and one 

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