84 LESSONS IN POULTRY KEEPING — SECOND SERIES. 



Occasioniilly it happens that the possibilities of a piece of ground are plainly been at a glance,' 

 and almost anyone at all familiar with the layiiif; out of poultry plants would know at a glance 

 just the best way to arrange a poultry plant there. Oftener the best arraiifjement for the poul- 

 try plant conies to one only after a good deal of thoughtful study of the situation. 



To anyone, however inexperience<l, looking at a well arranged poultry plant it seems a very 

 simple thing to lay out Buch a plant, but sometimes the simplest and most natural lonUiiig 

 arrangements have been reached only after a good deal of puzzling over the situation and 

 several remodelings. This is a feature by no means peculiar to cases such as we are now 

 discussing. 



Indeed partiality to a certain style of house or arrangement of yards has been a stumbling 

 block in the laying out of many a plant, when if, as it was found that the preferred style of 

 bouse and yard did not suit the case, the poultrynian had, set al)OUt making yards to fit the land 

 and his convenience and houses to suit, the solution of the problem would not have been long 

 delayed. 



A long continuous house requires for its location a piece of ground that is level one way, 

 otherwise the house must be built with one end higher than the other, or with short sections on 

 different levels, either of which arrangements is unsatisfactory, the former making the tem- 

 perature in the house very uneven, and the latter making passage through the house very 

 inconvenient. 



Again it very often happens that a piece of land most suitable for a long poultry house is so 

 situated that by locating one or more long houses on it the yards are very much restricted. I 

 have seen more than a few plants where all the advantages of giving the fowls good range had 

 been sacrificed in tliis way. 



Often the desiie to have the poultry plant convenient to the dwelling and to other outbuild- 

 ings is responsible for placing it where it is restricted on every side. Convenience in this 

 respect is a point well worth considering, but it ought not to be secured at a loss of other 

 advantages. It is certainly very much better to have a little longer walk between the dwell- 

 ing and the poultry buildings than to expend in other ways more time and labor than is saved 

 by having the poultry plant convenient to the house. If the poultry layout can be close to the 

 dwelling, and convenient and suitable in every other way also, so much the better. The small 

 plant of which a plot has been given combined in an unusual degree convenience to the 

 dwelling and convenience inevery part of the work. 



For the most satisfactory layout of a poultry plant that is not made to exactly fit a pre^(Tibed 

 space, the poultryman must take time. Even the "expert" is likely to make mistakes if he 

 goes on a •place to lay out a certain type of plant, and does so according to the situation as it 

 appears to him at the time. Indeed, plants that are laid out by experts in this way, und,in 

 fact, almost all poultry plants laid out on a large scale at the beginning are quite sure to prove 

 unsatisfactory unless all features of the business can be carried on according to the original 

 plan — which very rarely happens. The usual thing is for the business to develop along lines 

 somewhat different from what the projirietor designed, and in this case the equipment must be 

 changed to suit, or used at some disadvantage. 



If the poultryman, as I have more than once advised in the course of these lessons, is con- 

 tent to let his plant grow slowly, build only as he needs, and build Inexpensive buildings, he 

 gives himself ample time to consider different plans in their adaptability to his needs and 

 opportunities, and also to test different types of buildings and different methods on a small 

 scale before introducing them on alarge scale. This subject is one to which expert knowledge 

 is more difficult to apply than to most of the subjects on which poultrymen ask for advice. To 

 know a location thoroughly you must have summered and wintered with it several times over, 

 and seen the effects of different weather conditions. So I have always been reluctant to gi've 

 suggestions about the laying out of poultry plants for anything more than suggestions which 

 would help the parties Interested to solve the problem for themselves. I have laid out for 

 myself one large poultry plant and two small ones. In no case was I able, tliough I was 

 reasonably deliberate about It, and in the two later instances had a good deal of knowledge of 

 other plants to draw upon, to make a plan that was so good I could not, after using It a little 

 while, improve on it. This, I think, has been the common experience of those who have given 



