Personal Experiences 49 



who travels around the country and who, I believe, is employed 

 by the government, wrote an article for a poultry paper, stating 

 that food has no effect on making a hen set. I do not wonder 

 we advance so slowly when we are put off the right track by 

 men who are supposed to know. On another page in the same 

 paper was a piece on the same subject by another poultryman, 

 whom I had never heard of before. He claimed as I do — that it 

 is the food that makes hens set. If the ration is properly bal- 

 anced, the hen will lay right along and very seldom set. Such 

 was the case when my hens had the bread-and-milk ration. They 

 never set, but laid better than any hens I ever owned. If the 

 ration is over-balanced, a hen often goes to setting after laying 

 only two or three eggs, and you will often notice in feeding 

 ready-mixed foods that your hens will lay many eggs but in a 

 short time will begin to set, and you will have nothing but 

 setting hens on your farm, which is not very profitable. Too 

 much protein in the feed is the cause of this trouble; it may be 

 caused from too much protein in the beef-scrap or too much 

 protein in the wheat or bran. It is particularly noticeable that 

 a change of bran will cause it. 



The first twenty experiments caused the hens to grow large 

 red combs and to continue to keep in good condition, although 

 they laid only one egg about every other day. About a month 

 later in conducting the same experiments the hens in the best 

 condition began for a little while to lay nearly an egg a day, 

 and then wanted to set. The hens that were not in such good 

 condition became worse during the last ten experiments. The 

 hens that were entirely out of condition picked up in the first 

 twenty experiments and looked fine. 



No wonder I could never learn anything about the poultry 

 business. Wasn't it possible ever to obtain the same results 

 when I gave the same feed? Why should a few weeks or a few 

 months make any difference, especially in the spring of the 



