CHAPTER XXV 

 BREAKING UP BROODINESS 



Hen's Business is to Lay Eggs.— On farms devoted to egg pro- 

 duction it is the hen's exclusive business to produce this product 

 in the greatest number, and it is her manager's duty to see that 

 she is equipped with every facility toward this end, with no chance 

 for even a temporary cessation of activities. Where poultry is 

 raised on a large scale the hen is not held responsible for rearing 

 next season's flock of pullets.. It is far more economical to per- 

 form this work by artificial means — with the aid of incubators 

 and brooders; in consequence the hen is denied any participa- 

 tion in the furtherance of her species, save the laying of the egg, 

 and any inclination toward these maternal ambitions must be 

 promptly discouraged. 



Production is not Continuous. — Contrary, perhaps, to the 

 opinion of the novice, egg production is not a sequence of certain 

 quantities of correctly proportioned nutrients taken into the 

 body daily, digested, assimilated and then converted into a 

 regular supply of eggs — a continuous operation, as it were, un- 

 interrupted so long as the hen's health and. vigor are maintained, 

 and her care is as it should be. 



The egg cells, scarcely visible to the naked eye, of which there 

 are many hundred in the well-bred normal fowl, and some author- 

 ities place the number of latent eggs at upwards of five thou- 

 sand, are stimulated and developed in series or clusters, sometimes 

 called "clutches" or "litters"; each series being ripened or held 

 dormant in accordance with the fowl's general health and her 

 capacity to consume sufficient quantities of nutrients essential 

 to the stimulation of the egg-producing organs. 



The number of cells in each series varies widely with diiiferent 



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