290 POULTRY CULTURE 



appearance of a mass of yolks of various sizes from full-grown to as 

 small as can be seen with the naked eye. A magnifying glass will 

 show many still smaller. It is commonly supposed that the number 

 of minute yolks is constitutionally and definitely fixed in each bird, 

 — that a bird cannot lay more than the original number, that it 

 will not lay all these unless kept in proper condition, and that, by 

 skillful management, a bird may be forced to produce in two or 

 three years as many of her predetermined quota of eggs as she 

 would naturally produce in six, eight, or more years. It has been 

 supposed until recendy that the original number of ovules in the 

 average hen did not exceed five or six hundred. Observations 

 at the Maine Agricultural Experiment Station showed that the 

 number which could be counted with the naked eye and a com- 

 mon reading glass varied from about fifteen hundred, a number 

 several times greater than the recorded production of the most 

 prolific hens, to more than thirty-six hundred. 



When the reproductive organs of the female bird are function- 

 ally active, each ovule, as it reaches maturity, is detached and passes 

 into the oviduct. As it passes down the oviduct it is first covered 

 with the white, or albumen, which is deposited in layers, and finally 

 by the lining membranes and the shell. 



Laying begins when growth ceases. Normally ^ laying begins at 

 maturity, but occasionally immature birds, especially of the smaller 

 and more precocious breeds, produce a few small eggs. The prema- 

 ture activity of the reproductive organs almost invariably results in 

 stunted growth and the postponement of the beginning of mature, 

 regular laying. Premature laying, though of no advantage, is often 

 considered by the poultry keeper an indication of reproductive vigor 



1 The common difficulty in getting eggs from hens in winter, and the tendency 

 of other Icinds of poultry not to lay until toward spring, seems to contradict this. 

 But the number of cases for which the statement holds good is so great as to 

 create the presumption that normally egg production in fowls commences immedi- 

 ately after growth is accomplished. The fact that wild birds wintering in a tem- 

 perate zone do not produce eggs until the following season does not prove that 

 under favorable conditions they would not. As the subject is developed in this 

 chapter, the reader should note that nearly every factor working against winter 

 egg production from hens works more effectively against the winter production 

 of eggs by wild land birds ; while, in addition, the unprotected wild bird is more 

 exposed to its enemies in the fall and early winter than at any other season. What 

 happens in domestication may sometimes be a better index of native tendencies 

 than the phenomena of wild life as they appear to the ordinary casual observer. 



