1914. 
THE RUKAb NEW-YORKER 
1453 
Poultry Questions. 
1 HAYE raised 50 pullets out of a flock 
of 100 chicks, White Wyandottes, which 
are just six months old. About what 
age should they begin to lay? How 
should chicks be fed to begin to lay 
early? I also wanted to raise around 
1,000 pullets for laying this coming 
season; can you give me any information 
as to breeds, feed and housing, and where 
I could sell the roosters for broilers, 
alive if possible. Give me the amount of 
feed for each hen and the different things 
to feed at each meal. L. c. R. 
Connecticut. 
Wyandottes that have been well reared 
should begin laying at about five months 
of age though some of the more preco¬ 
cious ones will get an earlier start. To 
encourage early laying one should begin 
as soon as the chicks are hatched and 
feed and care for them in such way that 
they will make rapid and uninterrupted 
progress to maturity. To this end, a 
variety of broken and ground grains 
should be used and meat or skim-milk, 
or both, should be fed in generous 
amounts. Feeding which merely keeps 
chicks growing produces Spring layers. 
If you wish to raise 1,000 good pullets 
you should plan to set about 8.000 eggs. 
With a 50 to 60 per cent, hatch, some¬ 
thing less than a 50 per cent mortality 
rate, and a pullet production of about 
one-half the total number of chicks, you 
could reasonably expect 1.000 desirable 
pullets in the Fall. The feeding and care 
of both sexes will be the same until the 
cockerels have reached a weight of from 
one and half to two pounds; they may 
then be sold as broilers through any 
commission house handling poultry pro¬ 
ducts. To give full details of breeding, 
feeding, housing and marketing would 
require a good sized volume. You w r ill 
find all these things discussed in these 
columns during the season and any ques¬ 
tions that you wish to ask will be gladly 
answered. For your present flock a mash 
should be provided and the one used in 
the laying contest at the Storrs Experi¬ 
ment Station may be recommended. This 
is 200 pounds wheat bran, 100 pounds 
cornmeal, 100 pounds gluten feed, 100 
pounds ground oats. 75 pounds wheat 
middlings, 30 pounds meat scrap, 30 
pounds fish scrap and 25 pounds of low- 
grade flour. This is kept constantly be¬ 
fore the fowls in open hoppers, being 
mixed and fed dry. Mixed whole grains 
are also fed in the litter and the Cor¬ 
nell formula is a good one; 60 pounds 
corn, 60 pounds wheat, 30 pounds oats 
and 30 pounds buckwheat. The whole 
grains are usually fed twice daily, giving 
about a handful to each fowl. No exact 
amount can be specified and it is not 
necessary to follow any formula exactly 
in mixing. The above are given as good 
examples of grain combinations, how¬ 
ever. In addition, hens should have green 
food of some kind and grit, crushed oys¬ 
ter shells and perhaps charcoal should 
be available. An ample supply of water 
is essential. M. B. D. 
Respiratory Trouble. 
I AM losing my fowls; can you tell me 
what the trouble is. and how I can 
relieve it? The first symptom that I 
notice is that they gape like little chick¬ 
ens when they have the gapes, and grad¬ 
ually grow worse until their breathing is 
very difficult and causes a peculiar sound. 
They have red combs and look perfectly 
healthy. I examined their throats and 
there is no inflammation or soreness, but 
the windpipe is wide open and does not 
seem to close when they breathe. 
Virginia. H. M. v. 
There are certain forms of fungi which 
flourish in warm, damp, weather upon 
decaying vegetable matter and which are 
capable, when transferred to the mucous 
membranes of fowls, of establishing 
themselves there. These fungus growths 
may be found in various places along the 
respiratory tract, sometimes forming cir¬ 
cular patches at the opening of the wind¬ 
pipe and choking the fowl very much as 
gape-worms do in that affection. It may 
be these patches which you see at the 
opening of the windpipes in the fowls 
which you have examined; if so. see if 
you can remove them by the gentle use 
of a sliver of wood or toothpick. The 
treatment is rather preventive than cur¬ 
ative. The fowls should have dry quar¬ 
ters, free from musty, moldy, straw or 
other litter upon which these fungi live 
and from which they may be inhaled by 
the birds. If the fungi have found lodge¬ 
ment within the air passages, I know of 
no practicable measures for their re¬ 
moval. Strong, vigorous fowls are prob¬ 
ably much better able to resist these in¬ 
fections than are those of less vitality. 
M. B. D. 
Open-front Henhouse. 
1 ~ HAVE had an old chicken house re¬ 
modeled. The house 1 speak of has 
three large windows in it. I am a 
I •Hover in fresh air for chickens, the 
same as for human beings and therefore 
l ave had the windows removed and the 
• pening covered with chicken wire. The 
house is equipped with drop boards with 
porches on top and nests underneath, to 
which the hen gains access through jump¬ 
ing up in the back. The thermometer 
often drops below zero in Rockland Coun¬ 
ty, where I live. Friends are laughing 
at my plan and discouraging me, saying 
the hens will have frozen feet and will 
not lay all Winter. A curtain has been 
put over the perches for the Winter and 
a drop curtain outside over the opening 
where the windows were. My stock con¬ 
sists of 70 Plymouth Rocks, all March 
and April pullets. My intention was to 
house them all together as soon as the 
severe w T eather comes, placing hay and 
dried leaves for litter with plenty of 
scratch food. In the morning I feed 
them with hot mash of middlings, some¬ 
times with scraps, then about 4 P. M. 
plain oats, or oats soaked in hot water. 
Is this enough food for chickens housed 
for the Winter? Will you give me a 
good mixture for a scratch food and let 
me know if cracked oyster shells are 
necessary? E. c. s. 
Nanuet, N. Y. 
If your remodeled house is wind-tight 
on all sides but the one with the win¬ 
dows, and is not so long that drafts are 
formed by the wind blowing through 
from one window to another, as it prob¬ 
ably is not, your plan is a good one, 
and you will undoubtedly find that your 
fowls are far healthier and happier than 
those that your friends confine to tight 
houses. Be careful that the curtain 
over the perches does not make the space 
behind it too nearly airtight and you 
will probably have very few occasions to 
drop those over the outside openings. 
Feeding twice daily is sufficient but it 
is perhaps better to divide the grain into 
two feedings, morning and night, so as 
to induce more exercise while the fowls 
are hunting for it. If a moist mash is 
used, my preference would be to make 
the mid-day meal of it. A good grain 
ration, as recommended by the Cornell 
Station, is composed of 60 pounds 
wheat; 60 pounds corn; 30 pounds oats 
and 30 pounds buckwheat. Crushed oys¬ 
ter shells are needed unless an ample 
supply of lime from some other source 
is provided. M. b. d. 
AILING ANIMALS. 
Indigestion. 
1 HAVE a five-year-old colt, run down 
and very thin, does not seem to gain 
very fast. I am feeding four quarts 
three times a day of wheat bran and 
hominy, one-third wheat bran. Can you 
tell me what to feed to fatten her? 
L. w. B. 
one-third pounds for each hundred pounds 
of body weight as a day’s ration, accord¬ 
ing to the work he has to do. 2. Have the 
horse properly shod. Then work or 
abundantly exercise him every day. Feed 
plenty of sound, old whole oats. Prefer 
fluid extract of nux vomica to the pow¬ 
dered drug. Give one dram of it along 
with half an ounce of Fowler’s solution 
of arsenic night and morning, after a few 
smaller preliminary doses have been giv¬ 
en. Gradually discontinue the medicine 
as soon as it is not needed. 
Weak Calf. 
HAVE a calf, half Jersey and half 
Holstein, three months old. For the 
past week she has been too weak to 
stand up to graze more than 15 minutes 
at a time, although she has a good appe¬ 
tite, looks healthy and shows no signs 
of sickness, only weakness. Since she 
has not been able to graze I have fed her 
on milk. I have had a veterinarian to 
treat this Qplf, but- the results have not 
been satisfactory. Do you think worms 
are the cause and what would you sug¬ 
gest as a remedy? a. s. t. 
Virginia. 
The calf should have been well fed on 
milk and meals, instead of being allowed 
to graze. The paunch (rumen) of a 
young calf is not developed for the ac¬ 
commodation of much roughage, and it 
has to depend largely upon feed which 
can at once be cared for by the fourth 
stomach (abomasum) which is the true 
digestive stomach. The calf has prac¬ 
tically been starved and may not recover. 
At once add to the milk, fed four times 
a day, a little blood meal and flaxseed 
jelly, and also allow the calf free ac¬ 
cess to a mixture of oatmeal, bran and 
flaxseed meal, or feed calf meal with the 
milk. _ A tablespoouful of emulsion of 
cod liver oil given twice daily would 
prove beneficial. Medicine is not needed. 
A. S. A. 
“Madam, do you try to economize?” 
“I do.” “This book will give you many 
valuable points. Only 50 cents.” “I 
don’t need any points. I’ll just economize 
and save that 50 cents.”—Credit Lost. 
When you write advertisers mention The 
It. N.-Y. and you'll get a quick reply and a 
'‘square deal.” See guarantee editorial page. 
Outlasts 
The Barn 
I If/s Made of Lirn/ax Blocks 
■ It keeps my cows and horses free irom all the 
diseases and discomforts dne to cold, hard, slippery 
concrete and unsanitary plank floors. It is forever 
guaranteed against rot and decay, chipping or scal¬ 
ing; slivering, splintering or disintegrating;. It is 
Bar.itary, warm, restful, economical—-warranted to 
outlast the building. 
is made of antiseptically treated hard wood—so 
touch and fine-grained that it will last practically 
forever. It is moisture and germ proofed and no 
germ can live near it. It disinfects. 
Llavc the teeth attended to by a veter¬ 
inarian, as it is possible that milk-tooth 
crowns have not come away and are 
preventing perfect mastication of feed. 
Such crowns should be removed and 
sharp points filed down. It is a mistake 
to feed ground feed. Feed whole oats 
and one-ninth part of wheat bran along 
with best mixed hay. As worms may 
be present give the filly one ounce of 
turpentine shaken up in a pint of raw 
linseed oil, after starving her for 10 
hours. Twenty-foui hours after the oil 
mixture has been administered mix in 
the feed night and morning for a week 
one tablespoouful of a mixture of equal 
parts of sulphate of iron, salt and sul¬ 
phur; then skip 10 days and repeat. 
Depraved Appetite. 
W HAT is the trouble with my horse? 
He is a large horse and we feed 
him well, but if he has no hay to 
eat steadily all the time he starts to 
chew off the wood of his manger, and 
also pieces off any part of the stall 
he can reach. He chews on all the 
wood within reach. Is this some sick¬ 
ness? M. E. M. 
New York. 
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The horse is doing too little work and 
eating too much feed. Work or exercise 
hint daily and never let him stand for a 
single day idle in the stable. Allow him 
a roomy box stall when in the stable. 
Cover exposed manger and partition 
edges with tin or zinc. Allow free ac¬ 
cess to rock salt. If he eats his bedding 
use planing mill shavings or sawdust. 
Watch for worms in the manure. If 
they are seen, or if there is a fur of 
scaly substance around the anus, or 
Streaks of mucus there, give him worm 
powders in his feed night and morning 
for a week, then skip 10 days and re¬ 
peat. Let the powders consist of equal 
parts of dried sulphate of iron, sulphur 
and salt and the dose one tablespoouful. 
Feeding Sweet Corn ; Stumbling Horse. 
O WING to the scarcity and low price 
of horse (field) corn and the abund¬ 
ance and low price of ripe sweet corn, 
many farmers hereabouts are feeding 
their horses on ears of sweet corn sprink¬ 
ling same with salt. Is this a safe prac¬ 
tice in your opinion? 2. One of my horses 
has developed a habit of stumbling and 
sometimes falling. At times bis feet will 
simply slide from under him. He has 
been fed well and seems to be in pretty 
good physical condition. Someone has 
suggested a tonic. Is nux vomica a good 
tonic to build a horse up, and if so what 
is the usual dose when administered in 
form of powder? E. d. e. e. 
New Jersey. 
1. Immature sweet corn ears should 
form but a very small part of the ration 
for a horse. Fed in considerable quan¬ 
tities such feed will be likely to cause in¬ 
digestion, or irritation of the skin. Fed 
suddenly it may cause severe colic. Corn 
is best fed in Winter, as it is a fat and 
heat former. Using sound, dry ear corn 
(field) as a part ration in Summer and 
Fall combine as follows: Whole oats, 10 
parts; ear corn, six parts; wheat bran, 
three parts. A work horse will require of 
this one and one-fifth pounds to one and 
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THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
333 West 30th Street 
New York City 
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