poultry game. It is highly proper that we should throw 

 out the real culls and thereby reduce our feed bills and in- 

 crease the egg yield as everyone realizes that a cull hen is 

 good for nothing else but to breed vermin and eat up feed, 

 but one should make every allowance for the really good 

 hen. It certainly costs more to raise pullets to take the 

 place of hens than it does to give the good hen a chance. If 

 we paid more attention to the breeding of good foundation 

 stock and to take just a little bit better care of the hen, we 

 would not have so many culls as is the case at the present 

 time. It is really easier and far more profitable to pay a 

 little stricter attention to the elimination of lice from the 

 chickens' bodies, mites from the houses and coops, and 

 worms from their bodies, than it is to neglect these three 

 things which cause 95 % of all the grief in the poultry busi- 

 ness. 



THE ART OF CULLING THE POULTRY FLOCK 



Always cull in the day time. While the Hogan System is 

 all 0. K. to prove by, there are many ways of distinguishing 

 a laying hen. 



First of all, a great deal may be told by the head. The 

 head of a laying leghorn hen resembles very closely a sketch 

 of same on a pumpkin seed, — short beak, large red comb and 

 wattles, avoiding crow necks. Also the hen should have a 

 long back and slanting tail, not too thick through the thighs, 

 medium — neither long nor short legs. A hen may be judged 

 like a steer — a great deal is told by experience. 



Cull these hens, — sick, weak, lacking vigor, inactive, poor 

 eaters, molted or started to molt before September 1st un- 

 less they show good qualities, with small puckered dry vents, 

 hard dull colored combs, with thick or coarse stiff pelvic 

 bones, pelvic bones close together, small spread between 

 pelvic bones and rear end of keel, and full hard small abdo- 

 men. In breeds with yellow skin and shanks, the discarded 

 hens should also show yellow or medium yellow shanks, and 

 yellow beaks and vents. Also a white leghorn hen, when she 

 is not laying and is otherwise a non-producer, has yellow 

 beak and shanks ; the same is true when the breeding cock 

 is a Rhode Island Red. 



Save these hens, — healthy, strong, vigorous, alert, active, 

 good eaters, not moulting or just beginning to molt in Sep- 



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