RANKIN'S DUCK BOOK 



How to Turn Eggs. 



At the end of forty-eight hours they may be turned. 

 This should he done by gathering up the eggs at the end of 

 e gg" tra y and placing t&m upon the eggs in centre of the 

 tray, rolling the centre ones back to the end of the tray. The 

 tray should be reversed, and the same thing done to the other 

 end. It is not necessary that the eggs should be completely 

 reversed, — simply change the position, rolling over one-half 

 or one-third. 



The egg-trays should always be turned end for end, and 

 changed from end to centre of machine. This is necessary 

 in case there should not be a uniform heat in egg-chamber, 

 as it will equalize matters, and, in a measure, obviate the diffi- 

 culty. Now, all this* though -it-takes some time to describe 

 it, can be done very quickly, requiring only a few moments 

 for each machine. I usually- allow about ten minutes for each 

 1,000 eggs, though it can be done much quicker if one is in 

 a hurry. I was often requested by people to put in patent 

 automatic egg-turning trays in my machines, it would so 

 simplify matters. I replied: 



"So it would; and when you can produce a machine with 

 a perfect uniformity of heat in the egg-chamber, I should be 

 most happy to use an automatic tray, 'but I have never yet 

 seen that machine." In our own doublecased Monarch, in 

 cold weather was at least one degree difference between the 

 end and centre of egg-tray. In single-cased machines this 

 difference must be largely increased, and in automatic trays 

 the eggs must necessarily remain where they are placed 

 through the entire hatch. No.w, under these conditions, if 

 the heat is right in the centre of trays, it must be all wrong 

 in the ends. The hatch will be protracted long after the pro- 

 per time, and if those on the ends of trays come out at all it 

 will be forty-eight hours behind time and with weakened con- 

 stitutions, keeping one in constant stir with their sikly plaints. 

 It is needless to say that there is a great mortality among 

 birds of that description, and at the end of ten days they are 

 usually among the things that were. 



Hatching the Eggs. 



The next thing is testing the eggs. This matter is es- 

 sential as well as economical, with both hens and incubators. 

 I once knew a man who ran a six hundred-egg machine for 

 three weeks on one fertile egg. The other 599 proved in- 

 fertile, and he did not know it until they refused to hatch at 

 the end of three weeks — a great waste of oil, but a greater 

 waste of time, — three whole weeks in the best part of the 



£47 ] 



