EGGS AND EXERCISE 807 
the building up of flesh and the building up of eggs. The food 
question is specially dealt with elsewhere. 
Let us now assume that we have secured the laying machine 
and supplied it with the necessary material for turning out eggs. 
At least one other thing is necessary to secure the full results of 
our labours. The one thing needful is exercise. You must feed 
a hen well if you wish her to produce eggs, and if you feed her 
well without giving her exercise she will produce fat rather than 
eggs. There are two ways of eliminating fat in the egg machine. 
One is to go in for underfeeding, but this if anything is worse than 
overfeeding. The other method is to make the hen convert the 
surplus fat into energy, and this can only be done by giving her 
constant exercise. 
A lazy hen means a fat hen, and a fat hen means a semi-sterile 
hen. How then are we to give her sufficient exercise to get her 
into that hard, firm condition which is a prelude to continuous 
egg-production ? There are several methods, including automatic 
grain distributors which make the birds jump for every grain of 
food they eat. While this system may be suitable for small 
flocks, it is hardly practicable for poultry-farming on an extensive 
basis. The best and simplest method is to provide large, well- 
lighted scratching-sheds for your birds to work in a good many 
hours of the day. Always make them work for their food. One 
should divide their grain rations into two or three feeds. The 
floor of the scratching-shed should be well covered with litter of 
one sort or another. If not too expensive, the ideal litter would 
consist of granulated peat moss to a depth of about two inches, 
covered over with another three inches of straw. But any kind 
of dry litter is better than none at all. The cheapest is perhaps 
dried leaves, which may be gathered on any country road in the 
autumn, but such things as bracken, sawdust and shavings are 
quite suitable. Anything in which the grain can be buried will 
do to make the hens scratch for their food. 
Exercise and activity are almost as necessary as food and 
breeding to achieve a high rate of egg-production. It is often 
noticeable that the best layers are the most active birds, but 
