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hens do not lay? Poor, shivering, starving 
things' Can you expect a hen to give an egg 
for such care ? Would yon expect your cows to 
give milk without being fed ? Feed your poul¬ 
try with the same care you bestow on your 
Bheep, horses and cows ; give them a warm 
house to shelter them from the storms, and they 
will reward the care with eggs. m. b. d. 
of poultry that a fancy breeder would be too 
glad to pay a big prioe for a selected trio tor 
show. 
It is only where poultry are allowed great 
freedom that any breed can be reared in perfec¬ 
tion for several years in succession, unless at 
great expense of tune and food. I have found 
greater satisfaction in a flock all so nearly alike 
fowl-stock, in anticipation of the colder weather 
that will shortly be upon us. Their bouses 
should be examined and all cracks and broken 
plftoes in walls and roof Bhould be made tight. 
Window sashes, too, should be repaired if broken. 
The floors, nests and roosts should be thorough¬ 
ly cleansed, and the perches washed with kero¬ 
sene. All these thingB should be attended to 
I do not propose to give, in full, the rules and 
regulations for making poultry pay, but shall 
give a few facts that have come under my obser¬ 
vation. 
If one wishes to make money by keeping hens, 
he Bhould have them lay in winter when eggs 
are scarce and dear. This requires pullets 
hatched in the April or May previous. They 
must be kept in warm, dry, clean quarters, with 
plenty of good feed and water. Wheat should 
be the principal feed. Bnckwheat is valuable 
feed in winter. Com should be fed occasionally. 
Meat, green feed, sand, lime and shells, mast be 
provided. Carrots, onions, sweet apples and 
cabbage are the best for green feed. My hens 
refuse to lay well when fed on corn exclusively. 
Hens will barely live if fed on oats, and will 
starve on rye. Potatoes should not be given 
them in freezing weather. Give a warm mess 
eaoh morning, with oayenne pepper added oc¬ 
casionally, but feed dry grain for the balance of 
the day. Hens should not be chased or fright¬ 
ened in any way, if eggs are desired. 
New-fashioned breeds are of small conse¬ 
quence. If you keep hens to “ look at," keep 
pure bloods; if for profit, breed from laying 
hens, changing oooks each season, and if these 
are of a different breed, no harm will result. I 
am not afraid of crosses, and have now the 
nioest lot of pullets that I ever owned; but they 
have been crossed until one can hardly find two 
that look alike, and yet they are laying finely, 
which is the great object. My rule is, to keep 
a large flock of young hens through the winter 
and sell off most of them in May, reserving 
only enough old hens for breeding purpose*. 
When one raises ohiokens, of conrse about one 
half of them will be cocks, and if these are 
hatched early and well fed, they can be sold in 
July, or August, at good prices. Selling chick¬ 
ens early, and eggs in winter, is the only way I 
can keep hens profitably. Nelson Ritteb. 
Onondaga Co, N. Y. 
isons with others who nave expeninomeo m ™ 
same direction, she has concluded that the laying 
capabilities of the principal varieties are about 
as follows: 
Light Brahmas and Partridge Cochins—eggs, 
seven to the pound; lay 130 per annum. 
Dark Brahmas—eggs, eight to the pound ; lay 
120 per annum. 
Black, White, and Buff Cochins—eggs, eight 
to the pound; lay 125 per annum. 
Plymouth Books—eggs, eight to the pound; 
lay 150 per annum. 
Houdans—eggs, eight to the pound; lay 150 
per annum. 
La Fleche—eggs, seven to the pound; lay 130 
per annnm. 
Black Spanish—eggs, seven to the pound; lay 
140 per annum. 
Leghorns—eggs, nine to the pound; lay 160 
per annum. 
Hamburgs—eggs, nine to the pound; lay 150 
per annum. 
Polish—eggs, nine to the pound ; lay 125 per 
annum. 
Bantams—eggs, sixteen to the pound; lay 90 
per annnm. 
She regrets very much that she did not keep 
account of the cost of food consumed by eaoh 
variety. 
One Pound or Meat. —Water, 8 oz. ; fibrine 
and albumen, 1 oz. 122 grs.; gelatine, 1 oz. 62 
grs.; fat, 4 oz. 340 grs.; mineral, 850 grs. A 
hen may be calculated to consume one bushel 
of corn yearly and to lay twelve dozen, or eigh¬ 
teen pounds, of eggs. This is equivalent to 
saying that 31 pounds of com will produce, 
when fed to the hen, one pound of eggs. A 
pound of pork, on the contrary, requires about 
five and one-third pounds of oora for its pro¬ 
duction. When eggs are twenty-four cents a 
dozen and pork ten cents a pound, we have the 
bushel of corn fed producing $2.88 worth of 
eggs and but $1.05 worth of pork. Judging 
from these facts, eggs must be economical in 
their production and in their eating, and es¬ 
pecially fitted for the laboring man in replacing 
meat .—[ticientiflo Farmer. 
Ten Acees vs. Forty.—“ My first start,” said 
M. Guillord, of France, “ would be, if beginning 
life anew, to lease or buy about ten acres of land 
and stock it with pullets. I would build cheap 
sectioual hen-houses which could be moved to 
any part of the land ; would not keep more than 
ten pullets in each house, and would coax them 
to eat everything growing on the place. I would 
bonntifully feed them twioe a day besides, with 
cooked and seasoned food, would keep them 
clean and exercise them well, take advantage 
of the markets and keep no old Btock on hand, 
and, my word for it, I could make more money 
than many others with forty acres. 
In winter, when 
that I found difficulty in selecting an inferior 
bird for the table, than when I had some half 
a dozen sorts in small yards, and moreover, in 
the former case the profit in dollars and cents 
was much greater. 
In localities where there is a ready market for 
fresh eggs, I think their production more remu¬ 
nerative than the raising of chickens, and I 
would, under snch circumstances, give prefer¬ 
ence to Borne one of the non-sitting breeds. The 
Houdan is an extra fine fowl for the table, and 
a good layer of large, white eggs. These eggs, 
it is true, are not anite so large as those of the 
Black Spanish, bat the flesh of the latter is not 
fit for the table, and moreover, like the Leg¬ 
horns, their liability to lose their large combs 
and wattles in cold weather, unfits them for any 
bnt a warm climate. The Hamburgs and Po¬ 
lands are producers of a large number of small 
eggs; but then the Bize of the eggs is about 
proportionate to the amount of food consumed 
by all the non-flitting breeds. 
As to the number of birds that can be profita¬ 
bly kept about one set of farm buildings, I have 
found about one hundred to be the maximum 
where the climate will permit of foraging nearly 
the whole year; bnt where confinement to the 
houses is mperative during three or four 
months of winter, a much smaller number will 
afford more clear profit. Cobnplanteb. 
Warren Co., N. C. 
now. After the house is put in order, the occu¬ 
pants should have a variety of food. By varie¬ 
ty I mean both raw and cooked food, meal, 
vegetables, corn, oats, buckwheat, gravel, 
pounded bones, etc. The water given fowls to 
drink should be clean and warm during the win¬ 
ter. In a word, unless good care is taken of the 
hens during the winter months, and all their 
wants supplied, when yon go out to gather eggs, 
yon may be reminded of the story of the boy 
who said “ that he could not find any eggs, but 
saw a lot of hens standing around doing noth¬ 
ing.” *■ H - 8 - 
Knowerevllle, N. Y. 
POULTRY NONSENSE, 
«i Bxllino by kindnesB ” is a modern inven¬ 
tion, which enables one to take life without 
becoming amenable to the law. Fancy poultry 
palaces are just about as appropriate as gold 
earrings on a barefooted negress. High feed 
and close confinement are only an imitation of 
“ high life above stairs,” by which the aristoc¬ 
racy beoome enfeebled both in body and mind. 
Medicine given to healthy poultry to induce fer¬ 
tility is an outrage upon nature. Why do we 
not attempt to increase the human population 
by the same means we employ to multiply the 
feathered bipeds ? All the weak, infertile, run¬ 
down fancy-stock, now bo thoroughly spread 
broadcast over the land, is merely the natural 
result of doctoring. Hot-bed plants muBt be 
kept in a hot-bed to preserve their beauties; 
poultry so reared, and sold away from their 
pampering surroundings, are no exception. All 
the roup, gapes, pip and oholera, now so common 
and so destructive, are just what one bargains 
for when he undertakes to circumvent nature. 
Farmers and others who wish healthy stock, 
must see that they get it when they go to buy— 
and the only way to keep it so is to let the hens 
have their own way in choice of food, neats, 
time of producing eggs, etc., etc. I do not 
hfiiifive that there is a farmer in the land who 
POULTRY FOR PROFIT. 
Since the “ hen fever” has ceaBed to be epi¬ 
demic, the breeding of improved tenffv of poultry 
has become a legitimate branch of farming, and 
every variety has its Bnpporters, who never can 
agree as to the relative merits of their respective 
favorites. It is possible, though hardly proba¬ 
ble, that we may yet find the best points of all 
oombined in one bird. Having tried several 
kinds, including Brahmas, Cochins, Black Span¬ 
ish, Games, Sebright Bantams, Plymouth 
Rocks, Houdans, etc., etc., I am decidedly of 
opinion that where poultry and eggs for market 
are desired, no more profitable investment can 
be made by the owner of a flock of common 
barn-yard fowls, than the purchase of & pure¬ 
bred oook of any of the above varieties, excepting 
possibly the Sebrights. The professional breeder, 
and the amateur whose aim is pleasure not 
profit, do well in being sticklers for certain 
distinctive markings in hackle, saddle and wing 
coverts. 'There is a worthy class of farmers, 
however, who take pride in all their surround¬ 
ings, not omitting the poultry yard, but who are 
WHY SOME POULTRY DOES NOT PAY 
“ Poultbv don't pay,” exclaimed farmer B., 
as he threw a recent number of the Rusal upon 
the table, “ my hens don't lay enough eggs to 
use, to say nothing of any to sell.” 
Why? Let’s visit farmer B.’s poultry, and 
see. 
Winter Work for Fowls, 
fowls cannot run out of doors to get their need¬ 
ful exerciBe, they first mope and then get into 
mischief, in shape of egg and feather eating. 
When in winter I see my fowls " killing time ” 
by standing on one leg and sleeping during the 
day, I set them to work by burying oats or 
other grain under the Band and straw in the pens. 
Every fowl will immediately commence business 
and search the material over and over again, as 
thongb their lives depended on getting the last 
grain. I give them rowen hay, clover, corn 
huBkn, Ac., Ac., of which they are fond. One 
of the secrets of getting plenty of eggs in winter 
is keeping the hens at work. —Geo. S. Josselyn. 
Breeiuno Plymouth Rocks.— The Poultry 
World says that a medium light cock (not ex¬ 
tremely light-colored), with medium dark lienB, 
will average the best combination to give uni¬ 
formly good-colored obickenB. Some of the 
cbicku will be lighter than one might wish ; but, 
generally speaking, this plan is the safest, and 
the writer Bays that he has proved the fact to 
his own Batiefaction, that to have a majority of 
evenly-hued and marked Plymouth Rock chicks, 
the parents must not noth be of the darker plu¬ 
mage, however Bucoeasful such birds may be for 
matching in the show-pen. 
“I am surprised,” says Mr. Joseph Wallace, 
“ when I oonsider the rapidity of the growth of 
our oouutry, the general intelligence and inborn 
skill of our fanciers, the hobby, or I might add, 
the mania of our people to raise fowls, the mil¬ 
lions of dollars’ worth of poultry and eggs an¬ 
nually consumed, the demand for fancy stock, 
the cheapness of grain food, and the adaptation 
of our olimate to every known breed, that so 
few varieties are bred among us, aB oompared to 
some smaller countries in Europe. 
PREPARATIONS AGAINST WINTER FOR 
POULTRY. 
On account of the higher price obtained for 
eggs in the winter, it is very desirable that hens 
should “ shell ” them out liberally. Now how is 
this to be done ? Certainly not by neglect. Set 
it down and don’t you forget it, that no sloven 
can succeed with poultry. Farmers and others 
who keep one or two treefuls of fowls in the 
winter, must not expect their hens to lay many 
©ggg; but in the balmy month of June, when 
the voice of the onokoo is heard through the 
land, that treeful of fowls may be laying finely. 
Eggs, however, will then be plentiful in market 
and low in prioe. 
Now is the time to make provision for the 
Behind the barn in an old dilapidated building, 
the wretched foirdB are huddled together, ex¬ 
posed to the cold winds of winter, nncared for, 
having to go without food, or wade through the 
snow to pick up a scanty livelihood from off the 
barn floor, and going without water from the 
time it freezes np in the winter until spring. 
Thus treated, is it any wonder that this man’s 
constantly changing from one breed to another. 
Now, if each of these men would select snob 
birds as may strike his fancy in size, plumage, 
or any other particular, and when snch fowls 
have been secured, if he would endeavor to 
Improve them by reserving tho best for breed¬ 
ing, and by care and such attention as he giveB 
big other Btook, he would soon have such a flock 
