US Till'. THAI' XKHT TKXT HOOK 



molting flock docs not prove that most of the birds arc laying an occa- 

 sional egg. One or more hens arc very probably laying all of the eggs. 



I have had something like .so eggs in October "from 21 hens." but 

 four hens laid them all. One laid 2:5, 17 did not lay an egg. 



It is this principle that makes references to flocks of hens as laying a 

 certain number of eggs sometimes appear unsatisfactory to one who has 

 been accustomed to treat as laying hens only those individuals that ac- 

 tually do lay. and to credit a bird with being a "good layer" only when 

 that bird lias proven her worth in the nest. 



Practical necessities require that we keep our hens in flocks and treat 

 each flock as a unit in a great measure, but they do not require that we 

 sink individual performance out of sight altogether. 



The product of the hen is low in value, individually considered. So. 

 also, is a single grain of wheat, but the expert goes into the wheat field 

 and carefully fertilizes one kind of wheat with another and afterward 

 collects, grain by grain, the seed that will later produce a new and 

 better strain of wheat that may later enrich the very farmer who sneered 

 at his work on the ground that it was not "practical." 



MEAT OR EGGS! WHICH? 



That poultry breeding, as a business, is yet far behind the breeding 

 of cattle and horses is well shown by the general practice of attempting 

 to unite, in one breed, or in a single "strain'' or family of one breed 

 about all of the qualities that all hens, separately considered, are known 

 to possess. Thus, in attempting the impossible, the breeder can never 

 attain the highest development of any one quality. 



If we desire to hatch and rear chickens with our own hens we must 

 to be sure of the best results, breed hens that possess the incubating in- 

 stinct in a high degree and are well adapted, by size and disposition, to 

 mother the chicks. 



Such females as these can never give the best results in egg pro- 

 duction. For great egg production we want females that arc not much 

 inclined to broodines-. 



While broodiness can be controlled to a considerable degree, when 

 suitable means arc employed, it is an obstacle to prolificacy in proportion 

 to the strength of the tendency. It certainly is not determined by 

 methods of feeding or composition of feeds to the extent that many 

 suppose. 



The tendency to convert the food elements into flesh or eggs is also, 

 in a very marked degree, an individual trait. It is not clear how either 

 of these tendencies can ever become a family characteristic until the 

 breeder separates the one tendency from the oilier, for we cannot gel 

 the maximum of profit in eggs and meal in one and the same bird, no 

 matter how we feed. 



