A REVOLUTION IN EGG PRODUCTION lOS 



dawn is not due until about eight o'clock in the mornng, and so a 

 natural hen is not supposed to quit her downy roost until that hour. 

 But this Chicago man has equipped his hen house with electric lights. 

 These he switches on at six o'clock in the morning. 



The poor hens are aroused by the glare of light and their consorts 

 loudly crow to hail the dawn of artificial day. Down from their roosts 

 troop the fowls and straightway they make for their nests. With 

 some twelve hours of light before them, the hens busy themselves in 

 laying, and every hen does her duty once every three days, which is 

 a better egg laying average than obtains when there is no electric 

 light inducement to laying. 



As natural darkness comes over Chicago, the gentleman turns on 

 the electric light, and until nine o'clock the poor hens are kept awake, 

 under the delusion that it is still daylight. 



Such cruelty to the hens should be punished. The man ought to 

 be forced to eat a dozen eggs every day." 



The "Electrical World" of February 6th, 1915, had the 

 following : 



"EGG PRODUCTION INCREASED BY ELECTRIC LIGHT" 



"According to the testimony of Mrs. George G. Newell, of *Brook- 

 field, 111., a suburb of Chicago, the effect of using artificial light in 

 her chicken house to simulate the long days of summer has been 

 the trippling of the egg output of her hens. In their tungsten-lighted 

 compartments these estimable chickens now average one hundred 

 fifty eggs per hen per year. A total of 18,000 eggs was produced in 

 the Newell coops last year. 



The increase in the productiveness of the hens has resulted, it 

 is explained, from the duplication of summer lighting conditions dur- 

 ing the dark days of winter. It was Mrs. Newell's theory that the 

 hens did not lay many eggs during the winter months because they 

 spent more time on their roosts and had less opportunity for scratch- 

 ing about for food. At a nominal cost the electric service of the 

 Public Service Company of Northern Illinois was extended to the 

 hen house. Each of the two sections is provided with a two candle- 

 power lamp and a one hundred candlepower cluster. 



At 6 a. m. on dark winter mornings when the family arises the 

 lamps are switched on in the coops. At once the feathered occupants 

 are roused to the day's activity of scratching for food. After the 

 appearance of daylight outside, the lamps are turned off. With the 

 return of dusk in the late afternoon they go on again, and they con- 

 tinue to burn until eight o'clock, when all are turned off except the 

 two candlepower units. These lamps give a low illumination, simu- 

 lating dusk, and the hens at once prepare to go on their roosts. 



*Brookfield, 111., has three depots and three postoffices, called 

 Hollywood, Brookfield and Congress Park. 



