1897 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
207 
THE EGYPTIAN "HATCHING OVEN” REVIVED. 
50,000 EGGS IN ONE INCUBATOR 
Wholesale Operations of a Wooden Hen. 
[EDITORIAL correspondence.] 
It is but a few years since the incubator was recog¬ 
nized as an important and well-nigh indispensable 
factor in poultry culture. In fact, without the 
incubator and brooder, commercial poultry raising 
on the large scale on which it is now conducted on 
many farms, would be utterly impossible. There 
have been great advances and improvements in the 
making of these machines since they have come into 
such general use, until it would seem that the limit is 
about reached. 
But now comes a longer step in advance in artificial 
incubation than any other previously taken. 
It involves the hatching of eggs on a scale, 
and at a cost, that throws all other attempts 
completely in the shade. It is nothing less 
than an incubator that has a capacity at one 
time of upwards of 40,000 ducks’ eggs or not 
less than 50,000 hens’ eggs, and which can 
be run at an outlay for heat and labor far 
below that of the incubators of the old 
style. This incubator is situated on the 
duck farm of Mr. Wm. H. Truslow, at / 
Stroudsburg, Pa., which was illustrated and 
described in The R. N.-Y. of October 12 and 
19, 1895. I visited the farm again last week 
for the purpose of seeing the new Cyphers 
Mammoth incubator, and after being im¬ 
mured in its depths for a considerable time, 
I can testify to the fact that it maintains a 
very warm summer temperature, and that 
it is hatching eggs as well as any other old hen. 
An outside view of the incubator is shown at Fig. 
97, and a view of one of the interior aisles at Fig. 98, 
with a boy just pushing into position one of the trays 
of eggs. The incubator is really a building very 
warmly and closely constructed, with an entrance 
only through a little lean-to at the right. The latter 
furnishes a room to test the eggs, to fill the trays and 
to perform the work necessary to the operation of the 
incubator. In a cellar beneath it, is the hot-water 
heater which furnishes the heat for the incubator. 
This heater is one of the common well-known makes, 
many of which are in use for heating dwellings. 
They are considered superior to steam. The venti¬ 
lator on top is so arranged that it furnishes an outlet 
for the heated air automatically should the interior 
temperature become too high. The little box-like 
addition between the two windows shields the open¬ 
ing which admits fresh air to the heating pipes, and 
prevents any interference by the wind. 
Inside this building, is the incubator proper, really 
a big box closely constructed of felt, and separated 
from the outside by a passageway entirely 
around it. There are two aisles like the one 
shown at Fig. 98, and entrance is had from 
the lean-to to each one by close-fitting double 
swinging doors. The pipes from the heater 
pass around next the outside under the floor 
of the building. As the air is heated, it 
passes up next the outside through an airspace 
which extends nearly to the top of the build¬ 
ing ; it then passes over, and is diffused down 
through the egg chamber. There is a con¬ 
stant circulation of air, producing what Mr. 
Cyphers calls ventilation by diffusion. The 
air inside was as pure and fresh as that out¬ 
side, yet there was no perceptible current. 
This is one of the special features of the 
Cyphers incubators. After passing down 
through the eggs, the air is drawn off through 
a pipe which passes to the furnace-room 
which is almost air-tight, and this air feeds 
the furnace. No moisture is required, as 
there are no direct drafts to dry out the eggs. 
As we passed through the first swinging 
door into the outside passageway, we struck 
a decidedly summer atmosphere. We passed 
first around the outside; at each corner 
hung a thermometer, and each indicated 
101 degrees. This is the temperature that Mr. T. 
has been trying to maintain, though he thinks that 
further experiments may show that this is a trifle too 
high. The eggs in this incubator are not cooled 
daily as are those in the ordinary incubators, hence 
it seems necessary to run it at a lower temperature 
than the others. Experiments thus far seem to indi¬ 
cate that 101 may be a little too high for the best re¬ 
sults. If the temperature is too high, the hatching is 
hastened, and the ducks are not likely to be so 
strong. If the temperature is too low, the hatching 
is delayed, and the ducks are likely to be weak. It is 
yet a matter of experiment to learn just what is the 
best temperature. By means of thermostats, the ma¬ 
chine is made largely self-regulating, so that the draft 
of the furnace is opened and-shut, and the action of 
the ventilators is controlled. If there should be any 
hitch in these, and the temperature rise dangerously 
high, an electric alarm at the house gives warning at 
once. The temperatures of these thermometers have 
been recorded four times daily for a long period of 
time, at regular hours, and the variation has never 
been more than the fraction of a degree, and this 
through a great variety of weather. 
Passing through the second set of swing doors, we 
found ourselves in the aisle where the boy is pictured 
holding the tray of eggs. There are two of these 
aisles. One of the trays is shown standing on end 
back of the boy ; the bottoms are made of transverse 
rollers ; this is to enable the turning of the eggs by a 
new scheme. When in place, the rollers in the bot¬ 
tom of the trays rest about in the middle on a strip 
A WOODEN HEN WITH 50,000 CHICKS. Fig. 97. 
that extends the width of the incubator. By a simple 
device, this strip is moved, and the eggs in the whole 
range of trays are turned. Mr. Truslow said that, if 
the incubator were full of eggs, he could turn them 
all in five minutes. In his old incubators, with not 
more than one-fourth the capacity, it took 1)4 hour 
for each turning. The eggs are put into the incu¬ 
bator twice a week, Wednesdays and Saturdays. When 
they are first put in, they are placed at the top ; then 
when fresh ones are added, they are moved down a 
peg, and the fresh ones put at the top, and so on, so 
that, by the time the ducks are ready to hatch, they 
are on the lower levels. A thermometer hung in the 
aisle at the level of each tray, and these showed a 
variation of only a small fraction of a degree. The 
uniformity of temperature shown is remarkable. 
This incubator is not yet entirely out of the experi¬ 
mental stage, though the difficulties inseparable from 
a new invention have been met and overcome, one by 
one, until it seems to work nearly to perfection. It 
is little affected by variations in the outside tempera¬ 
ture, however extreme. The expense of operation is 
AN INSIDE VIEW OF THE BIG WOODEN HEN. Fig. 98 
almost nothing. Mr. Truslow said that the cost for 
coal would not exceed SI per week, and if the machine 
were filled, it would cost no more. The time required 
to attend the fire, turn the eggs, and do the necessary 
work is very little. On the two days that fresh eggs 
are put in, testing is done, and then a longer time is 
required. The ordinary testing lamp is used, but it 
is probable that some new device will yet be devised 
to shorten the time required for this work. But the 
whole expense of operation is but a fraction of that 
of the ordinary incubators. 
The cost of one of these machines complete is some¬ 
thing like $3,000. This amount would hardly buy 
enough of the ordinary incubators to hold the eggs 
that this holds. Then these incubators would need a 
building to shelter them, and that amount would 
hardly erect a suitable building for that purpose. So- 
its economy in several directions is apparent. True, 
few are in a position to use or need such an incubator ; 
but if one be, he can produce ducks or chicks at a 
much less cost than his neighbors. It is a wholesale 
way of doing business, and some enterprising man 
may invest in one of these Mammoth machines and 
do the hatching for a whole township. This would 
be something on the style of the hatching ovens of 
the Egyptians, which turned out chickens in immense 
quantities which were bartered for the eggs brought 
in by the farmers. It is certainly a revolutionary 
method of bringing chicks and ducks out of their 
shells, and makes one wonder as to what will be the 
next development. 
Mr. Truslow has a complete incubator house filled 
with one of the best makes of the regular 
incubators, made especially for hatching 
ducks (he hasn’t a hen on his place, and 
hatches little but ducks). Yet he says that, 
if this machine continue to do as good 
work as it has done so far, he will not start 
up the old machines at all. He is enabled 
to dispense with the services of one hand 
by using this, and the expense for heat is 
but a small fraction of that of the old ma¬ 
chines. The machine was built last year, run 
experimentally for a short time then ; many 
changes has been made from the original 
plan and, as now perfected, he thinks it will 
give better results than the best of the old 
machines. The ducks were hatching when I 
was in the machine, and they seemed to 
come out strong and vigorous. It requires 
brains and intelligence to run one of these 
machines, as, indeed, it does to run any ; but this is 
on such a large scale that a mistake or blunder would 
be more disastrous than with a smaller one. 
Mr. Truslow has been testing a small incubator 
made by Mr. Cyphers, in which the same system of 
ventilation by diffusion is incorporated, and he says 
that the temperature is very uniform, and the results 
gratifying. _ F. h. v 
THE BUNCH OR VINELESS YAM. 
IIOW IT IS GROWN IN ARKANSAS. 
Under this name, two very distinct and very differ¬ 
ent sweet potatoes have been advertised and sold over 
the country for three years. The first was introduced 
by a seedsman of New York State, with a cut showing 
the potato with no vine, but a stalk something like the 
white potato. This was tried, but found wanting and 
disappointing in several particulars ; the potatoes 
were white and of very poor quality, and, instead of 
a stalk, there was a vine from four to six feet long. 
After one year’s trial, it was abandoned. The other 
one was introduced from Mississippi, where 
it was found growing in a field of the south¬ 
ern yellow yam ; it was introduced as the 
Bunch yam, but, recently, some have added, 
“or Vineless,” to the name, which has caused 
no little confusion. The southern Bunch or 
Vineless yam comes nearer being entitled to 
the name, “Vineless,” than any other, as 
it has the shortest vine of any (18 to 30 
inches). The tubers are yellow, skin and 
flesh, and of the highest per cent of saccharine 
matter of any potato grown at the Texas 
Experiment Station. The color and shape 
of the tubers very much resemble the yellow 
Jerseys. As grown here, they are the most 
productive of any, even exceeding the coarse 
Southern Queen and Shanghai. The vines 
not crossing the rows, enable the cultiva¬ 
tion to be almost entirely done with a plow. 
Bedding. —The potatoes are bedded in a 
hotbed about March 1, placing them as close 
together as possible without touching. They 
are covered with three inches of rich soil, 
the sashes put on and kept on until the plants 
appear, then they are given air and water as 
needed until danger of frost is past, then 
transplanted to the field. We piepare the 
ground by breaking and harrowing and opening fur¬ 
rows for the rows three feet apart with a shovel plow. 
Run two furrows on this with a turning plow, and we 
are ready for the plant setters. We strike off these lists 
just ahead of the droppers with a hoe or rake to 
lower the ridges, and to get a moist surface to drop 
and set the plants at 18 inches apart. We have the 
plants set as fast as dropped and they will not need 
any watering. 
Cultivation. —About 10 days after setting, we run 
out the little middle that was left in listing, and every 
week or 10 days throughout the season, run a sweep 
cultivator through the rows, one furrow to the 
The short, stocky vines will soon cover the 
or 
row. 
ridges and keep down the grass and weeds ; one hand- 
hoeing is sufficient to get the few bunches of weeds 
