THE CHICK BOOK 



17 



pounds; pearled barley, 15 pounds; corn, 10 pounds. We buy 

 the grains whole and have them ground up together into 

 a meal. To every 100 pounds of this meal we add 10 pounds 

 of ihe finest quality meat scraps. We continue to feed our 

 chicks four times a day until three months old, then we drop 

 one meal, and feed only three times a day, mixed grains in 

 the morning and noon, and mash at night. We aim to feed 

 all they will eat at each meal, without overfeeding. Now 

 and again when they do not appear hungry we drop a meal, 

 and they are benefited by it. 



At three months old we separate the sexes, giving the 

 cockerels one part of the farm, the pullets the other. 



W« have said nothing about charcoal, dry bran, tonics 

 and condition powders, simply because they are unneces- 

 sary. Grit of course we use and find we cannot get along 

 without it. 



While we are painfully aware that our method is not 

 perfect, we cannot overlook the fact that by following it as 

 here described, we have succeeded in bringing to maturity 

 over ninety per cent of all chicks put In the brooders. Our 

 chicks grow steadily from the shell up, our pullets begin 

 laying at six months old always. They have produced two 

 hundred eggs in one year. A good deal of this large egg 

 yield was due to the care given the pullets while growing 

 and after they began to lay, but had they not been bred 

 from layers we could not have reached these results. If only 

 those who decry the practice of breeding layers by the indi- 

 vidual record system would try it, they would soon become 

 converts to it. However, the proof of the pudding is the 

 eating of it; give our way a trial before you condemn it, 

 you will be pleased with the results. C. BRICAULT. 



POOD AND CABE GIVEN FLOCKS OF BROODER 

 CHICKS. 



As our present plan of feeding is giving such good re- 

 sults we will here give you a description of the care and iood 

 given our chicks. We leave the chicks in the machines until 

 the morning of the twenty-second day, taking out the trays 

 the night of the twenty-first day, thus giving the chicks 

 more room and light. 



The morning of the twenty-third day the chicks are 

 taken out and put into outdoor brooders and given a break- 

 fast of dry rolled oats, which we feed for a week or ten days. 

 A litae chopped lettuce Is much relished by the chicks also. 

 From rolled oats we go to a mixed food consisting of a pre- 

 pared poultry food with a little more rolled oats and m-eat 

 meal added to it. This we mix up with curdled milk until 

 It will crumble in the hand. This we feed until It is time 

 for whole grain and cracked corn, and we find it Is giving 

 grand results. We neglected to state at the beginning that 

 first and foremost the chicks are given plenty of fresh water 

 as well as good food, all of which make chicks grow and 

 keep them growing. Charcoal and fine grit are also among 

 the necessities of proper feeding. 



Great care should ,be taken to keep the brooders cleaned 

 at least once a week, and aired every day. 



Our predecessor always used Indoor brooders, but he 

 always had a great deal of trouble in keeping the chicks 

 warm early in the season and cool as the season advanced, 

 and the result was the loss of chicks. There is one point 

 In favor of indoor brooders, and that is in rainy weather 

 the chicks have more room, but with the style of brooders 

 we have now in use we have had no trouble on this score, 

 as we only put seventy-five into each brooder, which is but 

 half their capacity, thus giving the chicks plenty of room 

 for different kinds of weather. 



Attached to each brooder is a small wire run, where the 

 chicks are let out for a week or ten days, until they get used 

 to going in and out of the brooder, then the fence is removed 



and the chicks have free range every pleasant day until 

 they are separated and put in the brooder house and taught 

 to go onto the roost. 



We think we have the best plan for young chick roosts 

 we have seen. We use four saw-horses placed at even dis- 

 tances apart. On these we have eleven roosts, four inches 

 wide by twenty feet long, placed about two inches apart. 

 These are fastened to the end horses by boring holes 

 through the slats and horses and putting spikes through 

 both, thus holding them all in position. We find the^ easy 

 to build, easy to clean and easy to take down and' store. 

 These eleven roosts will accommodate from three to four 

 hundred half-grown chicks. Our brooder house is situated 

 in a large pear orchard covering about eight acres; the soil 

 is gravel and sand and Is seeded to clover. We also have 

 two living springs, so our stock get plenty of good pure 

 water, lots of shade, ample range, with plenty of Insects 

 to keep them busy between meals. GRAY & STORKB. 



BROODER CHICKS AND GROWING STOCK— CARE 

 AND FOOD. 



It is a delightfully easy thing to tell how to raise chick- 

 ens. It is not quite so easy to successfully raise them. 

 There is little need for any extended directions for raising 

 chickens by the natural method other than In the points of 

 food and cleanliness, with some little attention to the de- 

 tails of housing and shade. With artificial hatching the 

 business takes on a development and calls for much greater 

 care and decidedly more attention to food and management. 



Little need be said of the hatching, except that the best 

 incubators should be used; the second rate cheaper machines 

 being generally unworthy of confidence; that Is, the prob- 

 lem of hatching is of sufficient importance that only the 

 very best means to this end should be accepted. 



In producing eggs for hatching the very best attention 

 must be given to the breeding stock, anfl If good results are 

 to be had thai- birds must be the product of several genera- 

 tions of hardy, vigorous stock. 



The strongest emphasis may be placed upon the fact 

 that it is much easier to hatch chickens than it Is to raise 

 them after they are hatched, and the first two weeks In the 

 little bird's life is a crucial period, and under some condi- 

 tions the second two weeks is harder to tide over than the 

 first fortnight, yet with due care and proper attention to 

 the warmth and food they may be and are successfully car- 

 ried to an age after which death is generally the result of 

 accident rather than ailment or disease. 



What they shall be fed when taken from the machine 

 at the expiration of twenty-four or thirty-six hours' Is a 

 question which has exercised the mind of every producer 

 of chickens. Every conceivable sort of food has been sug- 

 gested, recommended and tried in more or less cases. We 

 believe that the simpler the ration the better the chicken 

 and the surer the success In its raising. All fancy mixtures 

 and fussy feeding notions may safely be eliminated. The 

 oldtime mixture of boiled eggs and cracker crumbs is now- 

 a-days pretty generally neglected. In some instances breed- 

 ers are using this mixture successfully, but in more cases 

 they are killing their chickens apparently by its use. We 

 have tried practically every system from the egg and crumb 

 diet to that of dry food alone, including baked cakes, bread 

 crumbs and various oat foods and so on, et cetera, et cetera, 

 and have gradually simmered down to the point where we 

 now feed exclusively for the first two days a mixture of two- 

 thirds wheat bran and one-third Indian meal moistened 

 with milk, and to this we add about five per cent of fine 

 gravel or grit. The chickens are fed all they can eat. In 

 fact It Is before them practically all the time for the .first 

 forty-eight hours, and from then until a week or two of age 



