368 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
May 13 
The Hen. 
A HEN COUNTRY. 
A writer in the Chicago Record says 
that the Kansas hens produced 84,145,733 
worth of eggs and meat last year. 
‘ ‘Many a Kansas girl has been educated 
by the ‘ helpful hen.’ Many an aspiring 
youth has been aided in obtaining a start 
toward the goal of fame at the law 
school, the medical school or the theo¬ 
logical seminary, by the poultry yard 
behind his father’s barn. 
“ One of the big firms handling poultry 
in this State has its headquarters at 
Wichita, and ships 500 cars of poultry 
and eggs every year to New York, Phila¬ 
delphia, and many other cities in the Par 
East, where it has contracts to supply 
steamship companies, hotels and market 
men. It makes contracts with farmers 
to supply so many eggs and so many 
chickens for the season, delivered at cer¬ 
tain central points, where there are cold 
storage facilities. There the eggs are 
inspected and packed, the chickens are 
killed, dressed and stored until there is 
a car-load. This Wichita firm ships a 
good deal to Mexico, San Francisco and 
Denver, and the mining towns of Colo¬ 
rado and Arizona, where eggs and poultry 
command abetter price than in the East, 
but the demand is comparatively limited. 
“ Very few chickens are raised by ar¬ 
tificial processes. The incubator is not 
popular. The farmers say it ‘ costs more 
than it comes to,’ and that God’s plan of 
creating poultry is the best. 
“ This morning we visited a big pack¬ 
inghouse at the pretty town of Winfield. 
The proprietor told us that he handled 
80,000 cases of eggs last year, 30 dozen 
to the case, which, you can ascertain by 
a simple calculation, means 2,400 000 
dozens, or 28,800,000 eggs. Every one of 
those eggs was carefully inspected in a 
dark room, where rows of young men 
were sitting behind a couple of holes in 
the wall just big enough to admit the 
end of an egg. It looked like an ex¬ 
tensive exhibition of chiaro-scuro, but 
was the busiest and most important por¬ 
tion of the establishment. Taking up 
two eggs in each hand with a dexterity 
due to long experience, the testers would 
turn them quickly toward the light for 
an instant, and then drop them into dif¬ 
ferent boxes that stood at their sides. 
In one box went the perfect eggs, in an¬ 
other those that were dirty or doubtful, 
and in the third those which the late 
Bill Nye would describe as having in¬ 
sufficient ventilation. 
“ Every Spring, Mr. Baden packs away 
in a regular temperature of 30 degrees, 
600,000 dozens of eggs to await the high 
prices of the following Winter. At this 
season of the year, he can buy eggs for 
six, eight and 10 cents a dozen. He has 
bought them as low as four and five 
cents when the hens were particularly 
industrious, and he has paid as high as 
22 cents when they were lazy and the 
weather was bad. At present, they are 
selling in the wholesale markets of the 
cities for 10, 12 and 15 cents; in the 
Winter at 20 to 25 cents a dozen. Mr. 
Baden says he has told eggs as high as 
50 cents a dozen wholesale. 
“ Every groceryman within a radius of 
100 miles is his agent. They take them 
from the farmers’ wives in trade, pack 
them in boxes which he fuimishes, and 
ship them daily to his place at Winfield. 
He has buyers with wagons constantly 
traveling from house to house along the 
country roads, who deliver their pur¬ 
chases at the nearest railroad point, and 
are paid commissions for wh at they bring 
in. There are few large henneries. I 
heard of a man who had 4,000 hens, but 
have not been able to find him, and con¬ 
clude that he must be a myth. The aver¬ 
age farmer keeps not more than 100 or 
200 hens, and can furnish from five to six 
dozen eggs daily during the season. As 
the cold weather comes on, the supply 
diminishes, for no means have been found 
to make a hen work when she doesn’t 
want to. 
“ The feathers are practically worth¬ 
less, although they are saved and sold to 
upholsterers. The price averages two 
cents a pound, but the entire product 
last year came to less than $2,000. which 
is a small item in a big business. The 
price of chickens is pretty regular the 
year around, and ranges from five to six 
cents a pound alive. After they are 
dressed, they bring from 12 to 15 cents 
in the wholesale markets ” 
portance than the incubator. But we 
think you will find the solution of your 
difficulty in the answer before referred to. 
Brooder Chicks; Fattening Cockerels. 
A. C. B. G., Maine .—I built a small chicken 
house last year, 6x8 feet, covered with paper, 
and a slide 6 x 12 inches in each end for ventila¬ 
tion. I used two homemade indoor brooders 
(had used them before with good success), but 
the chicks did not do well, and were troubled 
with bowel complaint. I fed hard-boiled eggs 
for a day or two, then meal scalded a little so as 
to be crumbly; as they got larger, I added wheat 
middlings to the mash, also fed some cracked 
corn and a little cut bone two or three times a 
THE WHITE WYANDOTTE FOWL 
A COMBINATION OF GOOD QUALITIES. 
I believe that the farmer wants a fowl 
with all the good qualities developed as 
highly as they possibly can be in one 
breed The breed nearest perfect in this 
respect, is the White Wyandotte. This 
is a comparatively new breed, coming 
from the Silver Wyandottes as sports 
about 1870 ; yet in the few years since 
they were originated, they have spread 
farther than any breed, and for numbers, 
now rival their much older competitor 
for public favor, the B. P. Rock. 
In size, the Standard calls for the fol¬ 
lowing weights : Cock, 8% pounds ; hen, 
6% pounds ; cockerel, 7% pounds ; pul¬ 
let, 5)4 pounds. In shape, they are short 
and broad in body, with deep, full 
b'easts and short legs, neck and tail. 
In fact, we seldom see one that is too 
blccky. They have small rose combs, 
short wattles, bright red earlobes, deep 
yellow or orange beaks and shanks and 
pure white plumage. The deep yellow 
color of skin, with their plump bodies, 
full, well-rounded breasts, and freedom 
from dark pinfeathers, place them at the 
head as dressed poultry. 
They are good layers of large brown 
eggs varying in shade from light to 
very dark. S mall flocks have been known 
to average over 200 in one year, and with 
proper care, they will rival the Leghorns 
as egg machines, especially in Winter. 
As sitters and mothers, they can’t be 
matched, and these points alone are 
enough to commend them to many that 
have had experience in hatching with 
the more nervous breeds, or have had 
their chicks trampled to death by the 
week; but I lost 50 to 75 per cent of each hatch. 
The last hatch I fed pinhead oatmeal, but they 
did worse, if anything, than the others. I kept 
fine grit, clam shells and water by them all the 
time, and they had an outdoor run in pleasant 
weather. I do not think there were any lice, as I 
kept a sharp watch for them. We have a cool 
sea breeze here nearly every morning that is bad 
for young chicks. Did the kerosene smoke and 
gas cause the trouble ? The house was tight, 
but I kept it well ventilated except when too cold 
or stormy. What is the best food for brooder 
chicks? How can I get flesh on to B. P. Rock 
cockerels three months old and upwards ? I feed 
cracked corn mostly, but they are likely to be 
all legs and frame, and not much meat. 
Ans —The trouble was caused by the 
chicks becoming chilled. If the brooder 
should get cool enough to make chicks 
crowd, even but one night, few of them 
will ever get over it. and they will con¬ 
tinue to die until the supply gives out. 
The liability of getting severely chilled 
is the greatest danger that brooder 
chicks have to pass through. If kept 
comfortably warm, they will do well on 
almost any kind of sound, healthful 
food, and if the brooders are too cold, 
no amount of nursing and careful feed¬ 
ing will bring them through. Probably, 
the best food is stale bread moistened 
with milk, for the first few days, gradu¬ 
ally substituting fine cracked corn and 
wheat, and a mixed feed of corn meal, 
oatmeal, wheat bran, equal parts, with 
10 per cent ground meat, five per cent 
ground charcoal, and a small quantity 
of fine grit, m'listened with milk or 
water, until they are two weeks old, 
when the bread may be discontinued. 
Let one or two feeds each day consist of 
cracked corn or cracked wheat. The 
best way to fatten young cockerels is 
to pen them rather closely to prevent 
too much running, and feed a mash con¬ 
sisting of three parts corn meal, one 
part wheat bran, one part ground meat, 
five per cent ground charcoal, five per 
cent fine grit; feed of this all they will 
eat twice, and whole or coarsely cracked 
corn once each day. j. e. stevenson. 
clumsy Asiatics. 
They are good foragers, and if given 
their freedom, will almost pick their 
living from the opening of Spring until 
the storms of Winter drive them to con¬ 
finement. Many farmers say, “I cannot 
afford to spend $2. $3 or $5 for a male 
bird or $2 or $3 for a setting of eggs.” 
Are they spending or investing it when 
they purchase a purebred male, or a set¬ 
ting of choice eggs? How many busi¬ 
ness men would hesitate to invest a much 
larger amount when it would raise the 
value of their stock 10 per cent in a year? 
It is seldom that a purebred male will 
not do this or more, when mated to a 
flock of common hen®. Breed purebred 
stock or grade up the flock by using 
gcod males. Don’t breed scrubs ! 
New York g. r. s. 
Hardiness of Incubator Chicks. 
D. C. S„ New York .—Are chickens more likely 
to die when hatched in an incubator than when 
hatched by hen 9 ? I bought an incubator last 
year, and the chickens, about four days after the 
hatch, began to die, apparent'y without atjy 
cause. About 30 per cent die, and they are just as 
likely to be large, strong chicks as any. The 
weak ones seem to have bowel trouble, but some 
die without any show of disease. We feed eggs 
and green stuff, and corn meal, and care for them 
the same as we always do when hatched by 
hens. 
Ans. —See answer to A. C. B. G. on this 
page. This may help to solve your diffi¬ 
culty. Becoming chilled is one of the 
greatest causes of loss in young chicks. 
Too much boiled egg and corn meal are, 
also, bad. Chicks hatched in a properly- 
handled incubator are just as hardy and 
vigorous as any. If the incubator is im¬ 
properly handled, there is likely to be 
trouble. The trouble is sometimes with 
the brooder, and poultrymen generally 
consider the brooder of even greater im¬ 
A SERHON FOR HEN. 
The man who earns his living with his 
brains cannot afford to neglect his body. 
The body is the furnace and boiler that 
furnishes steam to the brain. If the fur¬ 
nace is permitted to get clogged with clink¬ 
ers, the boiler will make no steam, and the 
delicate machinery of 
the brain will slow 
down and come to a 
dead stop. 
When a man finds 
that his ideas do not 
come as freely as 
they once did, he 
needn’t worry 
about his men¬ 
tal machinery, 
but he had 
better look to 
his body. His 
stomach and in¬ 
testines are clogged with the 
clinkers of indigestion. His 
blood is impure, and does 
not receive the proper ele¬ 
ments to put vim and speed 
into the machinery of the 
brain. If he neglects this 
condition he will suffer from headaches, 
sleeplessness, loss of appetite, confusion 
of ideas, despondency and lack of energy. 
Eventually he will break down with nerv¬ 
ous exhaustion or prostration. There is a 
remedy that will promptly put a man right 
under these conditions. It is Dr. Pierce’s 
Golden Medical Discovery. It cures indi¬ 
gestion, fills the blood with the vital ele¬ 
ments of life, tones the nerves, and makes! 
the brain bright, clear and active. It cures! 
all nerve and brain troubles due to in-1 
sufficient or improper nourishment. The 
“Golden Medical Discovery ” is for sale by 
all good medicine dealers, and only an un¬ 
scrupulous dealer will try to induce a cus¬ 
tomer to take_ some worthless remedy, j 
alleged to be “just as good.” 
Mr. Ned Nelson, the celebrated Irish Come¬ 
dian and Mimic, of 577 Royden Street, Camden, 
N. J., writes : “ We fulfilled an engagement of 
twelve weeks and the constant traveling gave 
me a bad touch of that dreaded disease called 
dyspepsia. I had tried everything possible to 
cure it till last week while playing at B. F. 
Keeth’s Bijou Theater, Philadelphia, in the 
Nelson Trio, a professional friend of mine 
advised me to try Dr. Pierce’s Golden Medical 
Discovery. I tried it, and, thank God, with 
good results.” 
Constipation is promptly cured by Dr. 
Pierce’s Pleasant Pellets. All madicine 
dealers. 
POULTRY 
♦ We keep everything in the POULTRY LINE, ♦ 
' Fencing, Feed, Incubators, Live Stock, Brooders A 
■ —anything—it’s our business. Call or let us ' 
' send yon onr illustrated catalogue—it’s free for ■ 
• the asking—it’s worth having. 
■ Excelsior Wire and Poultry Supply Co., 
♦ 28 Vesey Street, New York City. 
♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦< 
WHITE WYANDOTTES and standard¬ 
ised. Hens prolific layers. None better. Low prices. 
Write for egg cir. Ralph Woodward, New Rochelle, N.Y 
200 
C. F. 
young Barred P. Rocks; also Eggs. CIrcula 
free if you mention this paper. 
GIFFEN, Lock Box 85, St. ClairsviUe, Ohio. 
Blanchard’s White Leghorns. 
The leading strain of heavy layers. Eggs for hatch¬ 
ing from finest breeders and greatest layers out of 
1.200 hens. 15, 11.50; 30, $2.25; 60, $4; 100, $6. Send for 
clr. H. J. BLANCHARD, Groton, Tompkins Co., N. Y. 
W, WYANDOTTE EGGS ^crr. 
white prolific. J. T. COTHRAN, New Rochelle, N.Y 
30 B. P. R. Hens, $30; 18 B. Leghorns, 
$15; few W. P. R. and W. Wyandottes. Eggs, 50c. per 
13. Stamp. Mus. J. P. HELL1NG8, Dover, Del. 
White Wyandottes.—S end for circu¬ 
lar. Geo. R. Schauber, Box Y, Ballston Lake, N.Y 
White Plymouth Rocks a Specialty. 
Eggs. $1 for 15. J08. P. PALMER, Geiger’s Mills. Pa. 
White Wyandottes Exclusively.— 
Write wants. Spencer’s Poultry Farm, Phenix, R. 1. 
Best Farm Breeds.—B uff Rocks, Buff 
Leghorns, Mammoth Bronze Turkeys. Eggs now. 
SAMUEL DUNBAR, Elkhom, Wis. 
THE IMPROVED 
VICTOR-Incubator 
Batohes Chicken, by Steam. Abaolntely 
self-regulating. The ilmpleit, moat 
reliable, and eheaoeat first-clani Ratehar 
._•“ thimarket. Circular* FREE- 
CEO. EKTEL CO., QUINCY, TT.V., 
LOUSY SITTING HENS 
will leave their neeta at every op¬ 
portunity, grow thinner and thinner— 
often die before hatching time. 
Lambert’s Death to Lice 
will clean a hen, sitting or standing, the 
minute you put it on. It will not injure 
eggs or little chickens. Trial alee lOo 
£ ost paid. 64-page POULTRY 
tOOK FREE. 
D. J. LAMBERT, 
Box SO? Apponaug, R. L 
MITES AND LICE 
on your poultry? Paint 
roosts with Lee’s Lice Killer. 
All done. Next morning look 
and see alllice and mites lying 
dead on roost boards. Many 
report finding them in piles a 
half inch deep where each fowl 
roosted the night before.Seeing 
is believing. Same with hogs or 
sheep. Paint rubbing posts or 
sprinkle floor of sleeping pen. 
All done. No more lice, mites' 
or fleas. No handling, no labor. 
Cheap, only 75 cts. for a gallon 
can. Want some? No doubt an 
agent near you if not in your own 
town. If not, take an agency yourself. Sample 
post paid 10 cts. Write for full particulars and 
new 64 -page book on “Insects” and diseases of 
poultry and stock. Our methods make easy the 
extermination of all kinds of insects and vermin. 
SCO. H. LEE CO., Omaha,Neb. or68 Murrey St., New York 
FumaCarbon Bisulphide 
Nowl8 thetimefor lilftnnftllllftlfP to sleep 
farmers to put If UUUUVIUUIVd with 
“ FUMA.” 
EDWARD K. TAYLOR, Cleveland, Ohio. 
The Business Hen. 
By H. W. COLLING WOOD. Price, 40c. 
This book deals with the business side of poultry- 
keep ng. giving accurate accounts of the methods 
followed on several piodtable poultry farms. 
IT COVERS THE WHOLE GROUND. 
The Rural New-Yorker sells all farm books. 
A specialty cf quoting piices on combinations. Ad¬ 
vice to readers given free. 
Some Bargain Combinations. 
This is a popular combination. The four books are 
by P. H. Jacobs, and illustrated. The poultry papers 
are well edited, and recognized authorities 
Price alone 
Poultry Keeper.$0.50 
Inter-State Poultryman.50 
Designs for Poultry Houses.25 
Incubators and Brooders.25 
Diseases of Poultry.25 
How to Judge Fowls.25 
The Rural New-Yorker. l.oo 
Total. .$3.00 
Combination price, $1.50. 
Thrlce-a-Week World. 
Gives you all the news of the whole world 
every other day. It is the next thing to a 
great daily paper. We can send it and The 
Rural New-Yorker, both one year, for $1.65 
Hoard’s Dairyman 
and The Rural New-Yorker, both one 
year, for ti.65 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER, NEW YORE. 
