426 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
Juno 30 
Live Stock Matters 
VIGOR GONE TO FEA THEN. 
GOOD BROILERS THAT “ DIE YOUNG.” 
The broiler plant at Ellerslie Farm is 
one of the most complete in the country. 
It is located on high, well-drained land, 
in a remarkably heaUhy section, and 
has every appliance needed for turn¬ 
ing out 20,000 broilers every year. The 
incubators are first-class, and as soon as 
the chicks are hatched, they are put into 
brooder houses of the most approved 
plan, and fed on the best food by skill¬ 
ful and experienced men. In spite of 
this, it must be said that the business is 
not satisfactory. The chicks hatch well, 
and start off on the race for life at a 
lively rate ; but, after a week or so, they 
die off by hundreds. There are no par¬ 
ticular signs of disease—they just droop 
and die from sheer weakness and lack of 
vitality. 
“ How do you account for it ? ” I asked 
Mr. Cottrell. 
“ I have come to the conclusion,” he 
said, “ that the birds lack vigor, and sim¬ 
ply cannot stand the heavy feeding needed 
to make a good broiler. My opinion is 
that breeders have well-nigh ruined sev¬ 
eral of our best meat breeds of poultry, 
by breeding them to a so-called ‘‘stand¬ 
ard,” and striving for perfection in 
feather and comb to the neglect of vigor 
and constitution.” 
“ You speak positively.” 
“Yes,because we have gone all through 
this thing with great care. We have tried 
“ new blood,” males from different fami¬ 
lies, and crossing with males of Ply¬ 
mouth Rock, Wyandotte, Brahma, Games 
and other breeds ; but in every case 
where the birds have come from yards 
noted for high scoring, the chicks have 
lacked vigor and cannot stand heavy 
feeding. Probably, Pit Games have 
given us the strongest chicks of any of 
the thoroughbreds ; while these birds 
have, of course, been bred by exterior 
markings to some extent, still, of neces¬ 
sity, a winning bird, even at a show, 
must possess high vigor and strength, 
and this is indicated in the chicks, 
though they are too slow to mature for 
first-class broilers.” 
“ What cross has given you the strong¬ 
est chicks ?” 
“ A cross of a common Dunghill rooster 
on our Plymouth Rock hens. There he 
is now.” 
The rooster in question was a medium¬ 
sized bird, such as one may find in 
hundreds of barnyards. lie was of half 
a dozen colors, and looked as though he 
might be a mixture of three or four dif¬ 
ferent breeds. He was a thoroughbred 
scrub if ever there was one ; but he was 
lively, and as “ tough as an owl.” The 
eggs from the pen over which he pre¬ 
sided, hatched out strong and vigorous 
chicks, that could stuff themselves with 
hearty food, and then live to digest it in 
time for another meal. These chicks 
were the strongest of any on the place ; 
almost all of them lived, but what a 
mixed up lot they were ! There were 
all shapes, sizes and colors—some with 
top-knots and feathered legs and some 
as clean as a bald-headed man. Some of 
these chicks would make broilers in 10 
weeks, while others needed nearer 10 
months. There they were, a striking 
illustration of the two great laws of 
breeding. 
The scrub male was a product of 
natural selection. There had been no 
artificial selection of ancestors for the 
purpose of perpetuating or making more 
prominent in him any particular charac¬ 
teristic of size, shape or color. His 
“blood” was a haphazard mixture—the 
result of “natural selection” which, in a 
flock of poultry, usually means the 
most vigorous male—the one capable of 
whipping the others. When crossed 
with hens of a uniform type, this rooster 
gave to the chicks just what his ances¬ 
tors gave him, viz., a vigorous constitu¬ 
tion, and a mixture of half a dozen differ¬ 
ent types of form and color. That is the 
point exactly—the male gave to the 
chicks what his ancestors gave him— 
modified, of course, in a slight degree, 
by the care and food he had received. 
The “thoroughbred” birds did the 
same. For several generations back, 
their breeders have said, “ That bird is 
all right except his comb and tail feath¬ 
ers ; we will mate him with a hen that 
is nearer right in these respects, and the 
result will be a chick that is nearer per¬ 
fect ! ” 
Very likely they picked out a hen with 
a narrow chest, or some constitutional 
weakness, and crossed her with the 
male. The resulting chick had a better¬ 
locking comb, but the weakness was in¬ 
tensified, and so it went on, year after 
year, mating with an eye to improve 
comb, feather or leg, until the resulting 
bird got into one of the breeding pens 
at Ellerslie. The chicks that came from 
the eggs he fertilized were sure to grow 
up with beautiful combs and tail feath¬ 
ers—but who wants these things in a 
broiler ? These chicks were expected to 
eat and stuff themselves with food, and 
grow quickly into little balls of fat. 
They could not do it, because their 
father could not give them the ability to 
hustle and digest that food. They could 
only die. Is there any good reason why 
strength and vitality should not be found 
in a bird that excels in the exterior 
markings of the “ standard ” ? If there 
is. the “ standard” should be made over 
at once if there is any hope of saving the 
broiler business from destruction. 
As a matter of fact, the broiler men 
need a special breed for their business. 
If that vigorous scrub at Ellerslie Farm 
could produce a uniform lot of plump, 
white chicks, shaped about like the 
White Plymouth Rock, and capable of 
growing rapidly and steadily for 10 
weeks without an hour’s sickness, he 
and his descendants would be worth mil¬ 
lions to the poultrymen of this land. 
Who is the skillful man to take the mix¬ 
ture out of his blood and retain its 
vigor ? H. w. C. 
FORKFULS OF FACTS. 
Profits in Oleo —Hoard’s Dairyman 
quotes the following significant passage 
from a Chicago daily paper : 
We have decided to close down our oleo depart¬ 
ment. The whole country seems to be against 
the use of the commodity, and so many laws have 
been passed restricting its use, that we feel it 
does not pay. We will, however, begin at once 
to build a large soap factory. 
This statement was made by Mr. Cudahy 
of the Cudahy Packing Company. Now 
you see where the “oleo ” fat will go to 
if it cannot be sold as butter. It will go 
to make soap. It is soap grease and 
nothing more. So long as oleo could be 
sold as butter, there was, evidently, a 
large profit in it—when it is forced to 
sail under its own colors, it is useful 
only as soap grease. A good deal of this 
grease will still be used in “filled” 
cheese, unless farmers bestir themselves 
and force Congress to pass the bill pro¬ 
hibiting its sale for the genuine article. 
Some “Balanced-Ration” Thoughts. 
—I see that the opinions thus far pub¬ 
lished on that balanced ration question, 
page 228, are decidedly in the affirma¬ 
tive. With all due respect for Mr. 
Cottrell, Smiths & Powell and others, I 
cannot help speculating. Were those 
two cows spoken of, eating what was, 
for them, a balanced ration ? Is clover a 
“well enough balanced ration” for all 
animals of different ages, conditions, 
etc. ? We know that a subtle principle 
which we call life, is contained in every 
seed and embryo animal, which, if given 
the proper conditions, will gather to 
itself enough of the elements of matter 
to form a complete specimen of its 
species, and also, in most cases, to per¬ 
petuate itself. We also know that there 
is an individuality about each of these 
vital principles which sometimes baffles 
all rules laid down by man. For instance, 
I know of an apparently healthy woman, 
wife of one of our prominent farmers, 
who is invariably thrown into convul¬ 
sions by eating a dish of strawberries. I 
know of others who cannot drink milk 
with impunity. These exceptions, how¬ 
ever, do not prove that strawberries and 
milk are not good articles of food. 
The statement that some animals are 
natural gluttons, I take with some allow¬ 
ance. It may be that their systems have 
been deprived of some element contained 
in the food upon which they are so ready 
to gorge themselves. Take, for instance, 
the birds of the air and the cattle upon 
a thousand hills. They must have count¬ 
less opportunities for cloying themselves, 
but do they ? Does not the individuality 
of each select for itself what the system 
needs, varying a seed with a worm, or a 
bite of clover with a bite of Timothy, 
for instance ? In view of such thoughts 
as these, I sometimes wonder if the 
successful feeder of the future will not 
keep constantly within easy access of 
his animals, such a variety of foods as 
will enable each animal to balance its 
own ration according to its individual 
needs. o. w. mates. 
IF YOU 
HAVE 
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and wish to prepare I 
SI LACE or cut 
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The above cut is one form of our 
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HEEBMER’S 
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Some Cow Theory. —Dr. Louis Robin¬ 
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this question, “ Why is the cow so 
especially useful in yielding an abun¬ 
dant supply of milk ?” He goes on to 
answer his own question as follows : 
Because she is naturally a forest animal, that 
had often to leave her baby behind, and to wander 
far for food. Wild cattle hide their young calves 
in the thickets. Unlike the colt, the calf has but 
feeble locomotive powers, and, therefore, it could 
not accompany the cow when she traveled to dis¬ 
tant glades, where grass was abundant. Thus 
the sucking calf cannot get his nutriment when¬ 
ever he wants it, as the young foal can, which is 
never away from the mare. He has to wait for 
(Continued on next page.) 
gUtecctinufouisi 
IN writing to advertisers, please always mention 
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Cider&Wine Press Machinery 
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Capacity. 10 to 120 Ebls. in 10 hr* 
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JOHN H. JACKSON, Successor to JACKSON BROS. Established 1852 
NEW YORK STATE DRAIN TILE and PIPE WORKS. Main Office: 76 Third Avenue. Albany. N. T. 
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