44 A REVOLUTION IN EGG PRODUCTION 



of thoroughbreds is kept the opportunity will come to sell eggs 

 for hatching (or day old chicks if the plant is a large one), 

 which will add considerably to the possible profits. 



However clever the poultryman, and however great his 

 sviccess in handling his flocks, if he has ambitions, he can never 

 attain the pinnacle in the poultry business unless his stock 

 is thoroughbred. 



Another reason which will make it desirable to keep 

 thoroughbreds, of only one variety or breed, is that each va- 

 riety or breed needs different treatment and feeding for results. 



Of still greater moment to the beginner, or struggler after 

 success, is the extra work entailed in keeping flocks separate, 

 when more than one breed is kept, and the constant watchful- 

 ness necessary, during the breeding season, to insure against 

 a mixture of the varieties of fowls. 



Meat Production a By-Product. 



To the poultryman who has chosen his breed with a view 

 to profitable egg production, the sale of chickens or fowls for 

 market will be a by-product proposition. 



Young cockerels and the cull pullets may be sold either as 

 squab broilers, or, from the time when about three months 

 old or more, as spring chickens. 



A hen will not continue to lay indefinitely, and the profit- 

 able period of egg laying will not extend much over three 

 years from the time the birds are matured. 



After a poultryman has got his start, it will therefore be 

 necessary to replace some of his stock with young birds an- 

 nually ; and he will thus have some of the older birds to send 

 to market each year. 



Oil or other fuel, litter, and feed will cost from between 

 eighteen and twenty-five cents per chicken to raise them to 

 the age of there months. 



After this age, it will cost more to feed them. They then 

 de^'elop faster and use more feed. An allowance may be made 

 of from ten to twelve cents per month to feed the pullets for 

 the next three months, by which time (when they are six 

 months old) they should be producing eggs if properly fed 

 and matured. 



