74 LESSONS IN POULTRY KEEPING — SECOND SERIES. 



Hence, while the wages paid the poultryman .at the start are not especially attractive, there 

 are in poultry culture such opportunities for advancement to responsible and lucrative positlonft 

 as open In every line to those who are competent, reliable, and industrious. 



What Poultry Keeping Offers in Recreation. 



American poultry fanciers and breeders, as a class, try to combine pleasure and profit in 

 {voultry culture, but we will consider here the pleasurable aspects of poultry keeping only, 

 passing the connection with profit with the remarii that those who went Into the poultry fancy 

 for pleasure have again and again found it at some lime their chief or sole reliance as a means 

 of livelihood, and been able to make a very good living at It. 



The simplest pleasure poultry keeping affords Is found in the production of eggs and poultry 

 for the family table. The desire to have poultry grown on the premises, and known to be 

 well fed and fresh when used for the table, and to have strictly fresh «ggs as wanted, seems to 

 lie responsible for most beginnings in poultry keeping In town and cities. The pleasure this 

 affords usually l)ear8 a direct relation to. the results obtained. Very often It leads directly to 

 the higher forms of pleasurable poultry culture. Of these we may consider here the few 

 principal ones. 



There is first of all the pleasure derived from the possession of fine fowls. From this there 

 comes naturally the desire to pioiluce tine fowls, and a keener pleasure in the sense of skill 

 which comes with successful accomplishment In this direclion. Many are satisfied to stop 

 here. To others possession and skill suggest competition, and their keenest pleasure is derived 

 from successes in the exhibition room, whivh give them reputation varying from local to world 

 wide according to the sphere in which they compete ami the frequency of their successes. 



To achieve these successes someone has to exercise rare artistic and creative skill and judg- 

 ment, and I think it may be said that our poultry fanciers today quite outclass breeders In all 

 other lines of live stock in kno« ledge of the principles of breeding and in skill in their applica- 

 tion. The man who goes into the fancy today finds himself pitted against combinations of art, 

 skill, and judgment which tax his faculties to their utmost. He finds himself also brought into 

 contact with men iu all relations in life who meet on the common ground of their interest in 

 jioultry, and he finds that the peculiar combination of qualities which make the fancier are not 

 the exclusive possession of any class of men or character of intellect. 



I think that fanciers generally will agree that the frankly democratic equality of the poultry 

 show is refreshing. Even those who in their social and lousiness relations are disposed to be 

 exclusive rarely display any of that spirit In the show room. On the contrary most of them 

 seem to be able to meet every other fancier on terms of equality, and it is a rare thing to see 

 any traces of either snobbishness or obsequiousness in the Intercourse of poultrymen. 



In Conclusion. 



In conclusion, let me remark what no doubt more than one reader has reflected for himself, 

 that poultry keeping ofters a vefy wide range of possibilities. And let me add, and impress it 

 upon the reader, that while the possibilities of what he may get are in the business, the proii- 

 abillties of what he will get are In himself, and to some extent in his circumstances. The 

 making of a competent and skillful poultryman is a slow process. When a very young man 

 fills those specifications it will almost invariably be found that his poultry culture began in 

 childhood and represents years of interest and application. When a man's interest in poultry 

 does not antedate his mature years his knowledge of poultry is almost always deficient In some 

 essentials — often strikingly so, yet by persistent application he may work out success in spite 

 of his limitations. For men somewhat advanced in years the outcome of a venture into poultry 

 keeping is so uncertain that I have never been able to see bow I could conscientiously advise 

 such to go Into it. The prospects of their making a success of it are, on the whole, too remote 

 to warrant the investment and the eflbrt. Men who have passed the age when they can obtain 

 new positions in the lines in which they have been engaged are constantly investigating poultry 

 culture, and looking for encouragement to take it up. For men who have bad an interest In 

 poultry which liy gradual extension may develop into an understanding of It having com- 

 mercial value it may be worth while to try what Ihey can do, liut I am not able to recall a 

 single Instance of a man advanced In years taking up poultry culture and making a success of It. 



