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CHICK BOOK 



Two Incubator Houses in Use on an English Poultry Farm 



ground few are well enough built to protect the machines in 

 severe weather without closing every source of fresh air,, 

 in which case that confined in the building, usually of small 

 contents, is soon impoverished by the lamps, which abstract 

 the oxygen, leaving unhealthy gases in its place. Houses 

 partly or wholly below ground to the eaves almost invari- 

 ably lack sufficient ventilation, because it is more difficult 

 to introduce fresh air. The best room of this kind is one 

 having a building above to temper the heat in summer and 

 the cold in winter; walls extending five feet below the ground, 

 and two feet above; one-fifth of this exposed area of walls 

 being of glass. Good ventilation necessitates a constant 

 changing of the air by bringing in fresh air from without 

 the building and removing the air which has become laden 

 with impurities. To accomplish this, fresh air must be in- 

 troduced near the ceiling of the room, preferably through a 

 cloth diaphram, and the foul air drawn out from near the 

 floor by means of tubes extending from within one foot 

 thereof, up through the highest point in the roof of the 

 building. In this manner the room may be freed from all 

 gases without the aid of direct drafts and the chicks will 

 be strong and healthy, if other conditions are favorable. 



ARTIFICIAL INCUBATION 



A CANADIAN GOVERNMENT EXPERT GIVES PRACTICAL POINTS ON THE USE OF INCUBATORS AND 

 SELECTION OF EGGS FOR HATCHING— RULES FOR RUNNING A MACHINE— ADVANTAGES OF INCUBATORS 



VICTOR FORTIER 



IDOOR 



EARLY spring is the time the beginner with the incubator 

 is apt to be sadly disappointed if he starts out with 

 the notion that he is going to have one of those ninety- 

 eight per cent hatches that the catalogues of some manu- 

 facturers tell about. 



Eggs for incubation should | 



always be carefully selected. The 

 fresher they are the better as the 

 hatch will be greater and the chicks 

 will be stronger. The little germ 

 or seed of life gradually grows weak- 

 er and weaker and at last has not 

 the strength to develop into a fine 

 healthy chick and may die in the 

 shell if the egg is kept too long. It 

 is better not to have them older than 

 ten days or ,two weeks. 



Eggs with imperfect shells 

 should be rejected, also those with 

 rough or chalky shells, with thin 

 spots, or that are badly formed. 

 These rarely hatch to advantage 

 and should be used in the kitchen. 



The eggs should come from 

 vigorous, healthy and well-fed 

 stock. Much depends on the feed- 

 ing of the breeders, especially of the 

 male bird. They should have plenty 

 of vegetables and green food as well 

 as animal food and those grains that 

 contain the bone and muscle form-, 

 ing elements. 



The eggs should be of medium 

 size, neither too large nor too small. 

 The small eggs generally denote in- 

 feriority and are either pullet eggs 

 or eggs from fat hens or eggs that 

 are laid by hens exhausted from having laid a long time. 



The eggs should be of one breed or class. The American 



classes can be hatched at the same time; that is, the Rocks, 



Wyandottes and R. I. Reds may be put into the same 



incubator at the same time, but they should not be mixed 



with the Asiatics and Mediterraneans. It takes twenty-one 



days to hatch all hen eggs, but if the eggs from Leghorns 

 . ^ 



WINDOW 



FLOOR PLAN 



TREMGH FOR WALLS 



GROUND PLAN OF TOLMAN INCUBATOR CELLAR 

 The walls of the cellar are 8 feet 6 inches high, which affords plenty of air space. The dimen- 

 sions of cellar inside are 22x30 feet. The walls at bottom are 3 feet thick, at the top 18 inches thick, 

 with a solid or what the masons call a "wet wall" extending down 3 feet from top; which makes it 

 frost-proof. 4 feet from floor up the wall is left open and by so doing a great deal more moisture is 

 gamed by takmg it mto the cellar from the the banks through the waUs. The cellar is drained bv a 

 trench under the walls, 3 feet wide and 1 foot deep, filled with small stones. 



are placed in the same machine as the Brahmas or Rocks^ 

 the Leghorns will hatch a few hours earlier than the others,. 



