108 MY POULTRY DAY BY DAY 
off for a spell than I would see empty water-troughs. A fowl can 
wait for a time for her food without any appreciable hurt, but I 
am certain that a laying hen suffers every time she goes to the water 
to drink and finds none. 
Why should some people be so niggardly with water? As a 
rule it costs nothing—only labour. That is probably the reason 
why the supply is sometimes stinted. With the ignorant, things 
that cost nothing, like water, light and fresh air, are despised, or at 
all events relegated to a secondary place. A moment’s thought 
will put the value of water to any live stock in its true place, and 
while water is vital to all stock, it is if possible more vital to the 
laying hen, who must pass an enormous quantity through her 
system in comparison with her size and weight. It is realised that 
a pullet weighing four pounds will lay her own weight in eggs every 
six weeks or so, and these, be it known, are roughly composed of 
three parts water. There is also the water required for the 
functioning of the various organs and tissues, not to mention the 
liquid required for the ordinary digestive processes. I have often 
said that I could tell the number of eggs laid per day by the 
amount of water consumed in the same time. One of these days 
the public will wake up to the extreme importance of water to 
the laying hen. 
In a report issued from the Missouri State Experiment Station, 
Mr C. T. Patterson (Director) gives the following results of an 
interesting experiment :— 
«« A number of pens which had been furnished water at all times 
were given water only once each day, all they would drink, then 
the water removed. The results were that the egg-yield was 
reduced 50 per cent. This reduction was the same in the different 
varieties. 
“A pen of 60 White Leghorns composed of old and young con- 
sumed 2% gallons of water daily during the warm weather. This 
would indicate that the average farm flock of 100 to 120 birds 
should be furnished at least 5 gallons of water per day. Laying 
hens frequently consume eight ounces of water daily. This means 
one gallon daily to 16 hens. 
