56 THE BEGINNER IN POULTRY 



I believe that the real reason for the failure of thou- 

 sands of incubator eggs to produce vigorous chicks, and 

 of other thousands of incubator chicks to come to ma- 

 turity, is to be sought in the quality of mind of the man 

 or woman who handles the stock and eggs. To this 

 may be added the exigencies of the fancier's trade. 

 These exigencies usually demand that birds be kept in 

 yards. As the trade begins earlier each year, it comes 

 about that a goodly proportion of the eggs for hatching 

 are laid at a season when eggs are produced contrary to 

 nature, by fowls in unnatural conditions, supplied with 

 foods that are not natural to the breeding season. 



Some time ago I inspected the brooder houses at one 

 of our State Agricultural Experiment Stations. I had 

 thought I noticed a slight hesitancy, when I had asked 

 to see the brooder stock. While I was looking them 

 over, the poultryman in charge told me confidentially 

 that he kept the brooder houses locked, and showed the 

 chicks as little as possible, because he was ashamed of 

 them. Yet the plant itself was good, the man clever 

 and systematic ; and he told me that he had done abso- 

 lutely everything he knew to be for the welfare of the 

 chicks. Still, even the best of them could scarcely be 

 said to look rugged, and a large proportion were actu- 

 ally drooping, or sick ; this was in February. 



We may admit that February, at the north, is still 

 rather early for hatching and brooding. Stock is con- 

 fined, and supplies of eggs are not wholly regular, so 

 that some will be kept in storage (if not " cold-storage ") 

 several weeks, it may be, before being incubated. And, 

 even if the eggs were all right when gathered, they may 

 be far from all right — for anything but " just-as-goods " 



